(Jamaica Observer) A British man who was involved in a fight with a female passenger onboard a Virgin Atlantic flight on Monday was slapped with J$150,000 (roughly £1,071) in fines after he pleaded guilty to the charges against him in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate’s Court yesterday.
During his first appearance in court on Tuesday, 32-year-old Jason Dixon had said he was innocent of the charges of malicious destruction of property, being an unruly passenger on a flight, and air rage.
Meanwhile, the charges against Danielle Bishop, the woman with whom Dixon had the fight, was dropped as the evidence indicated that she was defending herself during the melee. She was charged with malicious destruction of property, unruly behaviour as a passenger, and air rage. She was represented by attorney Burt Samuels.
The development came on a day when the two were scheduled to go on trial.
Dixon was fined J$50,000 or three months’ imprisonment on the charge of malicious destruction of property and J$100,000 or six months’ imprisonment on the charge of being an unruly passenger on a flight.
The air rage charge against him was dropped.
Dixon’s relatives were, up to late afternoon yesterday, working to come up with the money for the fine.
In passing the sentence yesterday, Magistrate Maxine Ellis said she would not impose the maximum penalty because Dixon pleaded guilty. The magistrate, however, did not mince words as she chided Dixon for his behaviour on the flight from England to Jamaica.
“No matter if you are sitting beside a pretty lady, where I come from no means no,” Ellis told Dixon while describing his behaviour as “reprehensible” and said he acted like an “idiot”.
“You see how stupid you are? You see how absolutely stupid you are?” Ellis chided. “You came here to bury a loved one and you act a fool.”
Dixon, who was decked in a black short-sleeved shirt, black denim and sports a tattoo on the left side of his neck, hung his head as his mother looked on.
In court on Tuesday, Bishop alleged that the fight started when a drunken Dixon attacked her after she shunned his sexual advances. She claimed that Dixon had been drinking from the start of the eight-hour flight and at some point started to ask her personal questions. Dixon, she alleged, held onto her hand while using derogatory terms to describe what he wanted to do to her.
Bishop told the court further that she was only defending herself against Dixon whom she alleged had ripped her clothes and yanked out strands of her hair. The two never knew each other previously. Several cabins on the aircraft were damaged during the brawl. The two were arrested and charged Monday afternoon, shortly after disembarking the flight at the Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston.
It was not immediately clear yesterday if Dixon or Bishop would be granted landing privileges by Immigration or sent home to England. Both were denied landing privileges as a result of the incident.
The court was told yesterday that Dixon, a tiler by trade, came to Jamaica to attend his grandfather’s funeral in Trelawny.
Dixon’s lawyer, Charles Williams, had earlier asked for leniency on behalf of his client, blaming his behaviour on excessive drinking. “[Dixon’s] romantic illusion was due to the amount of alcohol he had been drinking,” Williams told the Court.
He also asked the Court to consider the fact that Dixon was the father of a two-year-old child who depended on him for support.
“He totally misread her signal, thinking it would be a mile-high-club kind of affair,” Williams told the Observer after court.
A friend of Bishop’s, who declined to give his name, told the Observer after the proceedings that Bishop had travelled to the island with plans of volunteering as a teacher to children with learning disabilities in Spanish Town, St Catherine.
