MIAMI – A United Airlines flight from Miami to Washington’s Dulles International Airport last Tuesday was a bad trip in more ways than one after a passenger attacked crew members while high on psilocybin, also known as magic mushrooms, according to federal prosecutors.
According to an affidavit filed in Eastern Virginia district court, about an hour into United Airlines Flight 2116, Cherruy Sevilla began exhibiting “disturbing” and “uncontrolled” behavior.
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Prosecutors said Sevilla broke a piece off a locked lavatory door, opening the door while another passenger was inside.
According to the affidavit, Sevilla wandered around the plane, “running up and down the aisle, clapping loudly near the cockpit and yelling obscenities.”
Sevilla got in other passengers’ faces, “staring and smiling at them,” FBI Special Agent Daniel Markley wrote.
Sevilla wouldn’t remain seated after flight attendants asked him to and, instead, his screams and outbursts grew louder, according to prosecutors.
Sevilla, laying on the floor of the airplane, jumped up and twisted a flight attendant’s breast after she “calmly” instructed him to take his seat, Markley wrote. Other flight attendants, passengers and a law enforcement officer on the flight had to subdue him.
The officer eventually handcuffed Sevilla, who continued to yell “incoherent things” for the remainder of the flight, according to the affidavit.
Markley wrote that after boarding the plane he witnessed Sevilla “yelling profanities and unintelligible sounds.”
In an interview at the FBI’s office at Dulles, Sevilla admitted to consuming psilocybin at Miami International Airport before boarding the flight and “claimed to remember being out of his seat, being loud and touching people,” Markley wrote.
“This is not the first time that (Sevilla) had consumed psilocybin and (he) said he was not totally surprised that he acted this way after consuming it,” Markley said.
According to the complaint, Sevilla said he was sorry for his actions.
Sevilla, charged with assault and interfering with flight crew, appeared in federal court Wednesday and was released on personal recognizance.