E-Paper
Flyer accused of groping woman in first class says he ‘touched whatever he could reach’
A French national has been accused of sexually assaulting a co-passenger on a flight from Switzerland to the United States.
A French national has been accused of sexually assaulting a co-passenger on a flight from Switzerland to the United States. Guillaume Sebastien Roger Mattler, 48, faces a federal charge of abusive sexual contact over an incident that unfolded on Tuesday.
Mattler has been accused of sexually assaulting a 29-year-old woman who was seated next to him in the first-class section of a Swiss International Air Lines flight. After the incident, he tried to hand her a creepy note as well.
What happened on the flight?
According to a Local10 report, Mattler and the 29-year-old woman, whom he did not know, were “seated next to each other in the first-class cabin” during the flight from Zurich to Miami on Tuesday.
Two other passengers on the flight saw Mattler touching the woman as she slept, according to a federal criminal complaint. One “took several videos on his cell phone” while the other became “very concerned and went to find a flight attendant.”
“Witness 2 observed Mattler moving his hand in a ‘submarine’ motion, as if trying to get his hand under the Victim’s clothing and/or between her legs,“ FBI Special Agent Peter Ganzert wrote in the complaint.
When a flight attendant walked up to Mattler and the woman, he had “his hand on (her) crotch, over her jeans, making a scooping or rubbing motion on her vagina.”
What did the cabin crew do?
Mattler was unable to tell the flight attendant whether he knew the woman. He was moved to the economy class section of the plane.
Court documents say that the flight attendant then woke up the woman to explain what had happened. The woman was “shocked” and “began shaking and crying”.
The creepy note
Later, the cabin crew brought Mattler back to his seat in first class so he could collect his belongings. At this point, the French man tried to hand the woman a note saying, “You look beautiful when you are sleeping.”
Mattler told investigators that “nothing happened on the flight.” When confronted with video evidence, however, he “admitted that he touched the woman sitting next to him and that he did not think it was such a big deal.”
He claimed initially that he had touched the woman’s “lower back and upper buttocks”. Once informed that witnesses saw him touching her genital area, he said “he touched whatever he could reach from across the arm-rest.”
The French national was produced before a Miami federal court on Wednesday. His pre-trial detention hearing is slated for Monday.
