Durham woman kicked off flight after complaining of vomit on seat sues Frontier Airlines

Rosetta Swinney also is seeking unspecified punitive damages in the federal lawsuit, alleging abuse of process, defamation, negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The lawsuit also names Frontier's majority owner, Indigo Partners LLC, unidentified Frontier employees and the company that was supposed to clean the plane between flights as defendants.

Frontier declined to comment on the lawsuit.

Swinney and her 14-year-old daughter were returning to Raleigh-Durham International Airport on April 20 after attending a wedding in Las Vegas when they noticed an unknown fluid in the seat, on the seatback tray and on the floor of her daughter's assigned seat, according to the lawsuit.

Swinney said the fluid appeared to be vomit, and she called a flight attendant over to complain. The flight attendant then brought a container of Clorox wipes and rubber gloves so Swinney could clean up the mess, saying it wasn't her job to do it, according to the suit.

After complaining some more, Swinney and her daughter moved to two empty seats on the flight, but another Frontier employee then ordered them off the plane, according to the suit. When she refused, law enforcement officers boarded the plane and ordered her off, charging her with trespassing. Her daughter was placed in the custody of Nevada Child Protective Services.

Frontier initially ordered everyone off the flight "because of one rude passenger," but it then delayed the flight for an hour so that a crew could clean a "biohazard" on the plane, presumably the vomit that Swinney refused to clean up, according to the lawsuit.

Frontier issued a press release three days after the incident, claiming that flight attendants apologized for the vomit on the seat and quickly offered to move Swinney and her daughter to other seats but that Swinney "was unsatisfied with the response and became disruptive," the lawsuit states.

"Frontier's account of what transpired on Flight 2066 has been discredited by several passengers who had first-hand accounts of what occurred," the lawsuit states. "[Swinney] now suffers from humiliation, embarrassment and a tarnished reputation after Frontier defamed [her] character by knowingly disseminated lies surrounding [their] removal from Flight 2066."

The lawsuit alleges that Frontier misused law enforcement after airline staff refused to follow safety regulations "to remove all bio-waste from their aircraft," the lawsuit states.

"Defendants knowingly and recklessly disregarded the safety of [Swinney, her daughter] and all other passenger on Flight 2066 by failing to take immediate action to remove bio-waste that was potentially contaminated with a blood or airborne pathogens," the lawsuit states. "Instead, Defendants told a mother and her child to clean another person’s bio-waste. Essentially, Defendants were willing to leave the fate of the entire passengers' safety in the hands of a child."