According to Southwest Airlines, there were three reasons they pulled a mother and her 10-year-old aside on a flight to Denver on suspicions of child trafficking. For one, Mary MacCarthy and her daughter, Moira, boarded the plane late.
"We were in the last boarding group because we got the tickets last minute," Mary explained to KCNC Denver. The trip itself was a sad one. A beloved family member had died unexpectedly, and Mary and Moira were traveling to pay their respects.
Another notable part of the flight was that Moira and Mary couldn't find seats together at first. But Mary thinks that these excuses are all bogus. During the flight, she claims she and Moira weren't doing anything out of the ordinary. She said Moira was mostly busy with an audio book the entire time.
That led to reason No. 3 why they were questioned — the airline noticed that the two rarely talked during the flight. Some witnesses said that they overheard Mary telling Moira to be quiet.
But Mary is still unconvinced. She thinks that one of the reasons she was eyed was because she's white and Moira is half Black.
After being questioned after the flight, police and those with Southwest determined that Moira wasn't in any danger. But they chose to follow up a few days later. Mary took her own videos as personal proof after the incident and realized that her experience didn't necessarily match up with their account of it.
Mary told People how frightening the entire incident was. "I was confronted by two armed police officers. One started speaking to me, the other to my daughter. I was really confused because they seemed to know our names," she said. She admitted that, at first, she assumed they were there to tell her of the death of another family member while she was on board the plane.
"I want Southwest Airlines and the Denver police to be held accountable for what is undoubtedly a case of racial profiling involving a 10-year-old Black girl who was already suffering the worst day in her life — a death in her family," she added.
Watch the video to see Mary's personal footage of the incident.
