Tourists Detained in Sao Paolo
French tourists arrested in Brazil
SAO PAULO - Three French tourists arrested in Brazil after an altercation on board a plane "are not doing very well" in poor detention conditions, a consular official said on Thursday.
The French consul general in Sao Paulo, Sylvain Itte, visited two of them, men aged 60 and 63, in a prison in the city early Thursday to find they were crammed into a cell with 30 other detainees, the French official said.
The 60-year-old also suffered from diabetes and high blood pressure.
The third French citizen, a woman aged 54, was being kept in a holding cell in Sao Paulo's Guarulhos international airport pending a transfer to a women's prison. She had been there for four days without being able to shower, the official said.
The three are awaiting a court hearing before a judge that has been delayed because state prosecutors only submitted their case file late Thursday, theofficial from the French consulate said.
"We don't know the charges leveled against the French citizens," said the official, who could not be named because of French government policy.
The judge's decision on whether to keep the three in detention pending a possible court case was expected sometime Friday.
The three were arrested by Brazilian police early Monday after a row broke out on a Brazilian TAM airlines flight that had been due to leave late Sunday night but was delayed because of a technical problem.
They were part of a group of 25 elderly French vacationers returning to Paris after a two-week Atlantic cruise.
According to the consulate, the group demanded to be put on another flight after hearing that the TAM aircraft had a problem with its on-board computer.
Their apprehension came in the wake of a still-unexplained June 1 crash of an Air France airliner flying from Brazil to France that killed all 228 people on board.
TAM issued a statement on Thursday saying the group started an "altercation" on board that required the intervention of police because it "put flight safety in danger."
It did not specify the technical problem encountered, but said that after it was fixed the plane was unable to take off "because a woman passenger decided to get off the aircraft, which forced the baggage service to locate her bags."
All the remaining passengers were then put on another flight to Paris, it said.
The airline denied information given by consular officials that it had accused the group of French passengers of causing the original flight to be canceled.
The French consulate has complained to Brazilian authorities that it wasnot informed of the arrests immediately, as required under a Vienna Convention governing the detention of foreigners, and that it was initially prevented from seeing the three.
Comments
I am sure the passengers that got arrested, was behaving bad.
Otherwise they would not been arrested.
I have flown with TAM many times, it´s a great airline.
And ¨informer¨ what are you talking about?
You say it´s bad the flight crew on a Brazilian company don´t speak french?
You say they should do this because they fly from Sao Paulo to Paris.
Well i can say for sure that french pilot´s dont speak German Swedish Finnish Portuguese Spanish Italian Russian and all other language that are spoken in the destination they are going to.
Wake up french is tiny language.
It´s time for french people to learn english.
I was in this flight. The french guys were extremeley rude and making strong noise. In every country they would be in jail.
There are two points to be considered in this story. A French speaking representative would have allayed passenger fears and secondly all passengers on any flight should be able to control their behavior in light of the fact that any on board outbursts from them in these times is just cause for the intervention of security personnel. Some tourists from more developed countries also have a superior attitude and they ensure that airline passenger agents are aware of this when they check in for international flights. Threats of further violence at future world class events will do nothing to solve the predicament now at hand, which is the release of these middle aged to elderly persons.
I run a travel agency and lately the customer service from ALL the airlines has been the worst I have seen in 16 years. They have absolutely NO concern for the well being of any of their passengers. I do not think they will start to make money until they take a hard look at the way they treat their customers. Shame on TAM for the above issue.
TAM will pay for this injustice!!!
It is also to say that not just 3 peoples wanted to go out of the plane, but more than twenty.
The crew flying to Paris also could nt speak French, a shame for a flight SAO PAULO - PARIS, they weren t able to translate and calm the passengers.
So they also put the culp to the 3 french peoples, but they where more arested at the first moments.
So be prepared for soccer wolrd champion ship in 2014, as you take TAM it is secure until plane haven t any technical problems, and you will ignore them, even after 3.30 hours waiting. If not you pay a ticket to beeing treated like a terorist.
Should I mention 2016 ???? Olympic games ?
Is brasil ready for all the troubles ?
Post new comment