Nurse trying to nap on Southwest flight wakes up to passenger groping her, feds say
An emergency room nurse had just finished a full day of work and was looking forward to taking a nap when she boarded Southwest Airlines Flight 2026 bound for Atlanta, Georgia, according to federal court filings.
But shortly after falling asleep, prosecutors said, she woke up to find a stranger’s hand on her thigh.
The nurse reportedly removed the man’s hand and asked him to stop, but the unwanted touching continued, prosecutors said.
Now that stranger, 36-year-old Scott Russell Granden, of St. Louis, Missouri, will serve federal prison time after pleading guilty to felony charges of abusive sexual contact.
Granden was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison in the Northern District of Georgia on Tuesday, April 5, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a news release. He was also ordered to serve one year of supervised release and register as a sex offender.
U.S. Attorney Kurt R. Erskine said Granden’s actions “humiliated and degraded” the female passenger, and prosecutors urged the judge to sentence him at the high end of the recommended guidelines, according to court filings.
“He was engaging in a form of sexual bullying,” they said. “His crime is one of depravity, and it calls for a significant sentence.”
Public defenders appointed to represent Granden did not immediately respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment on Thursday, April 7.
The nurse encountered Granden on March 25, 2021, during a night flight from St. Louis to Atlanta, where she was planning to spend the weekend with friends. According to court documents, he was late and had to look for an empty seat — which happened to be next to her.
Prosecutors referred to the nurse in court documents as R.A.K.
R.A.K. reportedly told investigators that Granden was chatty when he boarded but she was tired and eager to sleep, so she drifted off after take-off. The nurse then “woke up abruptly” to find his hand on her leg, the government said in court documents.
“She innocently thought that he was bracing himself because of turbulence,” prosecutors said. “She was wrong.”
Granden was accused of moving his hand up her thigh toward her groin. R.A.K. removed it and told him to stop, the government said, but he did it again. Prosecutors said the nurse once again “pushed his hand away” and “ordered him to stop.”
R.A.K. tried to go back to sleep and closed her eyes. This time, Granden “nuzzled his face into R.A.K.’s neck, kissed her neck and told her how good she smelled,” court documents state. She told him to stop only to have him thrust his hands inside the pocket of her hoodie where her own hands were resting, prosecutors said.
Eventually he stopped, the government said, and the nurse tried to fall asleep again. But Granden squeezed her thigh a few minutes later, thensaid he had to use the bathroom.
R.A.K., who had an aisle seat, had to get up to let him out, at which point prosecutors said Granden slapped her on the butt.
In interviews with investigators after the plane landed, the passenger in the window seat said she thought R.A.K. and Granden were together because of his constant touching. But when Granden got up to use the bathroom, prosecutors said, R.A.K. looked at the passenger and asked, “Is he touching you too?”
The government said the window passenger was “in shock” and told investigators that she would have intervened if she had realized they weren’t a couple.
According to court documents, the window passenger “saw a look of desperation in R.A.K.’s eyes” and together they summoned a flight attendant, who moved Granden to another seat for the duration of the flight.
“The defendant’s actions were degrading and humiliating to R.A.K. He had no respect for her dignity and privacy, and being told to stop at least twice had no effect on him,” prosecutors said in sentencing documents. “It is unbelievable that, in the age of ‘no means no’ and ‘#metoo,’ a man would think that he can fondle a complete stranger whose only mistake was being on the same plane that he was on.”
The government said Granden’s alleged misconduct didn’t stop there.
When officers with the Atlanta Police Department responded to the gate after the plane landed and took him into custody, prosecutors said, Granden “started to shout vile racial epithets” at a Black police officer. He is accused of repeating the slurs multiple times.
Then, as he was being escorted to a police car, Granden reportedly pulled his pants down and yelled, “Rape!”
“Possibly wanting to show that his bigotry was not confined to race, the defendant called the APD officer a homophobic slur several times,” prosecutors said.
According to the government, Granden’s behavior after the flight “confirms that he has no respect for appropriate social boundaries.”
Granden was charged by criminal complaint on March 25, 2021. A grand jury indicted him in April, and he pleaded guilty in September.
Granden was released from jail on certain conditions — including home detention — after his initial arrest. But prosecutors later asked to have his bond revoked, saying he failed to follow curfew and never showed up for drug tests. A judge placed him on home confinement instead.
According to the government, Granden again failed to report for drug testing and ultimately tested positive for marijuana, prompting the judge to revoke his bond.
He has remained in custody since November, court documents show.
This story was originally published April 7, 2022 at 11:57 AM with the headline "Nurse trying to nap on Southwest flight wakes up to passenger groping her, feds say."
