Man Given 3 Years for Scalding Flight Attendant

A man who splashed scalding coffee on an airline attendant during a midair fracas was sentenced in Los Angeles to three years in prison, one of the severest sentences handed down by a federal judge for disrupting a flight.

“This business of disrupting airline flights is getting more serious every day,” U.S. District Judge Dickran Tevrizian said in handing down the sentence Monday.

Tevrizian jailed Thomas Kasper for 36 months, ordered him to pay $10,000 to flight attendant Marlene McDonnell--who suffered second-degree burns--and to repay Continental Airlines $112.94 for his Houston to Los Angeles ticket.

Prosecutors said Kasper, who pleaded guilty in January to a federal charge of interfering with the duties of a flight crew, was high on methamphetamines during the incident in July 1997.

After he was denied an upgrade to first class, Kasper went to the front of the plane, which was carrying 130 passengers, and declared: “We’re taking this plane down.”

According to prosecutors, Kasper tried to open an emergency door while the plane was in flight and when McDonnell tried to stop him, he waved two pots of hot coffee. During a struggle, the coffee spilled on her hands.

Susan Callihan, a woman with whom Kasper was traveling, tried to break into the cockpit during the disturbance. She was sentenced to two years in prison at her trial earlier this year.

An off-duty pilot who was on the flight told the jury at Callihan’s trial that he was prepared to kill the woman with an ax to prevent her entering the cockpit.

“He would have been justified to do so to save that plane and those passengers,” Tevrizian said Monday. “This was a serious event.”