Indian national gets 9-year of imprisonment for sexually abusing woman on board plane
An Indian techie was sent to prison for nine years after he was found guilty of sexually accusing a woman on a flight headed to Detroit, US.
Washington: An Indian techie in the US was sentenced to nine years of prison time on Friday for sexually assaulting a woman on board a plane earlier this year. The accused Prabhu Ramamoorthy (35), who came to the US on an H-1 B visa in 2015, hails from Tamil Nadu. Ramamoorthy, who was travelling on a Spirit Airlines flight between Las Vegas and Detroit, was arrested in Michigan by the Federal authorities. A federal court in Detroit sentenced him to nine years of prison time on charges of a "brazen sexual assault" against a fellow female passenger done earlier this year. The offender will be deported from the States after his sentence will be over.
According to evidence presented at the trial, Ramamoorthy sexually assaulted a 22-year-old woman while on board a flight on January 3. While the woman was seated next to him on the window side, his wife was seated on the other. The sexual abuse took place while the victim was sleeping. She told the investigators that she found the man's hands inside her pants which he had unbuttoned along with her shirt. After she was aware of the circumstances, she immediately contacted the flight attendants and reported the incident.
"Everyone has the right to be secure and safe when they travel on airplanes. We will not tolerate the behaviour of anyone, who takes advantage of victims who are in a vulnerable position. We appreciate the victim in this case for her courage to speak out," US Attorney Matthew Schneider said after the sentencing was announced.
Ramamoorthy was presented in front of the United States District Judge Terrence Berg in a trial which lasted for five days. The jury announced the guilty verdict after going through all the evidence and contemplating for three-and-a-half hours. The prosecutors had appealed for 11-year of imprisonment for the accused.
Timothy R Slater, Special Agent in Charge, a Detroit Division of the FBI, said that the judgement has proven that the safety of passengers in aircraft is a priority of the security officials.
The accused in his statement to the federal agents said that he had taken a pill and was in a deep sleep while the 22-year-old woman was sleeping on his knees. He further told the officials that he had requested the flight attendants to change his seat which went unheard by them. His wife gave similar statements, which either meant she was trying to cover up for her husband's actions or she was oblivious of his actions. He pretended to be a man stranded in the US without any knowledge of the English language despite him working in a technological job in the States.
In the past few years, many Indian nationals have been arrested and charged of sexual assaults while on board. FBI statistics indicate that investigations of mid-air sexual assaults increased by 66 per cent from 2014 to 2017.