A former flight attendant Ashley Geffre, 25, is suing Alaska Airlines for firing her after she reported she was drugged and raped by a first officer. Source - Kiro-TV
An Alaska Airlines flight attendant is suing her former employer, claiming she was fired after she reported she was drugged and raped by a first officer.
Ashley Geffre, 25, said she loved her job until things went south during an August 2017 work trip in Fort Lauderdale where she went out for dinner and drinks with a first officer and woke up naked and in pain.
However days after she reported the assault, she said she was fired "in retaliation", according to the Daily Mail.
Geffre said working for the airline was a 'dream job' until the assault took place in August 2017. Photo / Facebook
To add to the blow Geffre says the first officer even corroborated her story on possibly being drugged, claiming he was drugged too, yet he was not terminated.
Geffre, who hails from Graham, Washington, says she can't remember what happened after she went out with the first officer.
"The next day I woke up early in the morning around 6 or 7am. And I had no clothes on. My clothes were on every corner of the room and I was scared," she said to KIRO7.
"I felt severe cramping beyond menstrual pain. I felt itchy. I felt sexually assaulted. I had no idea what had happened," she added.
Later she learned from the Broward County Sheriff's Office that she was found in her own filth in a stairwell.
"I was found in a stairwell by a security guard who swore under oath he did find me in a stairwell with my pants to my ankles and I was slouched over with vomit on me," she said.
Alarmed she told the airline she could not fly.
"As soon as I returned to Seattle a few days later, they called me in for questioning. And I went in with my union rep and I had no idea it was going to lead to termination," Geffre said.
During a work trip to Fort Lauderdale she got dinner and drinks with a first officer and woke up naked and in pain in her hotel room. Photo / Facebook
Prior to the mishap, she said being a flight attendant was her "dream job".
"I've loved my job as a flight attendant. It's taken me amazing places. I've met incredible people," Geffre said.
"It was probably the best three years of my life," she added.
Despite sharing her traumatic report with the airline, she did not receive the sympathetic response.
"They called me dishonest. I've been called a liar by a company that I loved working for. I've been slut shamed by a company that I devoted my time to"' Geffre said.
Geffre claims in her lawsuit that the first officer wasn't fired in light of her report and continues to work for Alaska Airlines.
"Part of me is believing that the flight attendants and the pilots are treated very differently," she said.
Alaska Airlines says they have removed the first officer from duty, in a statement to KIRO7.
"Alaska Airlines has a firm non-retaliation policy. We can confirm that the First Officer was removed from duty immediately and has not flown since August 2017. When situations arise that are inconsistent with our values, we investigate them fully and act in accordance with our policies," the statement said.
Alaska Airlines is yet to respond to DailyMail.com's request for comment.
Geffre hopes that her lawsuit will change the system to pay more attention to sexual assault reports among employees.
"I feel that I made all of the right decisions and I would do them again in a heartbeat," she said.
But her report isn't the first of its kind with Alaska Airlines.
In March pilot Betty Pina, 39, sued the airline saying she was drugged and raped by married Captain Paul Engelian, 50, during an overnight stop in Minneapolis last June.
In March Betty Pina, 39, sued the airline saying she was drugged and raped by married Captain Paul Engelian, 50, during a work stop. Photo / Facebook
It was the first time that Pina, a pilot with 17 years experience, had met Engelian as she was the co-pilot for a flight from Anchorage to Seattle to Minneapolis last June.
"This is a problem. I'm not the first, but I would love to be the last, but this is a problem in this industry," Pina said.
In her lawsuit she claims Alaska Airlines is liable for the alleged rape, as well as how it handled the situation after Engelien was reported to company officials.
Engelian is still working for the company, as of March.
The Alaska Airlines lawsuits join a slew of sexual assault accusations to plague employees working in the skies.
Pina's lawsuit claims Alaska Airlines is liable for the alleged rape as well as how it handled the situation after Engelien was reported to company officials. Photo / Facebook
In March a woman claimed she was raped in the bathroom of an American Airlines flight and sued the airline after they offered a US$5,000 settlement.
A month later a SkyWest flight attendant accused a pilot of drugging and raping her during a layover.
Also in April a British Airways employee came under fire, accused of raping a flight attendant during a Singapore stop.
