Black Father Says Cops Stopped Him at Airport After Flight Attendant Was Concerned He Had Kidnapped His Biracial Kids

A Black father in Georgia blasted American Airlines on social media after he alleged a flight attendant arranged for police to meet him at the jetway to question whether he had kidnapped his biracial children.

David Ryan Harris was traveling from Atlanta to Los Angeles with his two sons on Sept. 15 when they were met by police on the jetway, he said in a video on Instagram. 

“A flight attendant had called ahead with some sort of concern that perhaps my mixed children weren’t my children because they were unresponsive during an interaction with her,” Harris said. The interaction in question was around 30 seconds, and consisted of the flight attendant asking the children for their names, Harris said.

One kid was described by Harris as “pretty shy,” and the father said his child “doesn’t owe” anyone a conversation or interaction. He also said the children were tired from being awakened early to make the morning flight.

“We’re met, embarrassingly so, by this AA employee and police officers,” he said in the video.

The police began to question him about his children, who are mixed race.

“I wanted to go through the roof, but I did not want my kids to see me handle the situation with anything other than grace and class,” he said.

After the interrogation, Harris said no apology was offered for their mistake. He said he tried to call the company’s customer service line to file a complaint but was directed to fire a digital complaint, which he did. After about a week with no response, he took to social media to publicize the problem and get a response from the airline. Harris is a musician with nearly 80,000 followers on Instagram, the platform he shared his story on.

In the caption of the original series of videos shared on Sept. 23, Harris said American Airlines had been his airline of choice for 19 years and he has logged close to one million miles. 

“I don’t care what you say if this had been a white dad/mom with 2 little black kids, they would probably been offered an upgrade, not an interrogation,” he wrote. “And maybe...just maybe it isn’t a race thing, but when you don’t respond at all, I’m left to make sense of the altercation on my own.”

Eventually, the airline acknowledged his complaint.

“We apologize for any misunderstanding that may have occurred. A member of our team is reaching out to the customer to learn more about their experience and address their concerns,” the company said in a statement, per the Atlanta Black Star.

On Monday, Harris said he had been contacted by a representative from the company who saw his story being shared on X, formerly Twitter, and reached out to explain the company has criteria for potential child trafficking situations. 

“There were many steps she could have taken before she lobbed the hand grenade of having the authorities called,” Harris said. “At the bare minimum, it was a knee-jerk reaction that was completely unnecessary and could've been avoided.”

For his trouble, Harris said the representative offered him 10,000 frequent flyer miles and told him an investigation would be launched.

“But you get 50,000 if you open an AA card, so it’s kind of insulting. But, you know, I took the miles, and I was just like, I’ll just make a mental note that this is kind of trash,” Harris said.