Man Stabs Co-Passenger On Flight; Why Did He Feel Threatened?

New Delhi: Imagine travelling in a fight and being under threat mid-air, without any knowledge.

A passenger recently had such a harrowing experience.

It was on an Alaska Airlines flight, travelling from Seattle to Las Vegas, that a man attempted to kill a fellow passenger with a makeshift weapon after a violent altercation mid air.

Julio Alvarez Lopez, the accused, was arrested at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas on January 24, a report in the New York Post said.

Lopez was charged with one count of assault with a dangerous weapon.

So what was his modus operandi?

Lopez was “fidgety” throughout the flight, and kept on putting and removing his gloves, using the bathroom for a long period during the flight’s descent.

“He sat down, got up a second time, and went to the restroom, where he was reportedly gone for ‘a while’,” Fox News reported.

After Lopez returned to his seat, he began “punching and hitting” the man seated across the aisle, and tried to stab him in the eye.

“During the altercation, the victim’s wife was screaming at the defendant to stop hitting her husband. A witness unbuckled her seatbelt and yelled at the defendant to stop,” an FBI agent wrote in court documents.

Lopez also struck the woman, who was trying to protect their seven-year-old son.

He told investigators that he was seeking asylum in the US, and added that he believed the co-passenger was with ‘the Cartel’ and was following him, as per Fox News.

The passenger who was attacked is alive, but he was severely injured.