United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit No. 19-1056 T. FORCHT DAGI, M.D., Plaintiff, Appellant, v. DELTA AIRLINES, INC., Defendant, Appellee. APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS [Hon. Douglas P. Woodlock, U.S. District Judge] Before Howard, Chief Judge, Thompson and Barron, Circuit Judges. Henry Herrmann for appellant. Christopher A. Duggan, with whom H. Reed Witherby, Pauline A. Jauquet, and Smith Duggan Buell & Rufo LLP, were on brief, for appellee. June 2, 2020 THOMPSON, Circuit Judge. When an airline passenger suffers "bodily injury . . . on board [an] aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking," his or her only legal recourse is to sue the airline for recovery under the Montreal Convention (a multilateral treaty -- more on that in a minute) that preempts any other local law claims the passenger could bring. See Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules for International Carriage by Air, May 28, 1999, S. Treaty Doc. No. 106-45 (2000) (the "Montreal Convention" or the "Convention"), ch. I, art. 1, §1; art. 17. The Convention also requires that the passenger bring any such suit within two years of "the date of arrival at the destination, or from the date on which the aircraft ought to have arrived, or from the date on which the carriage stopped." Id. at ch. III, art. 35, §1. Appellant, Dr. T. Forcht Dagi, M.D. ("Dagi"), is one such passenger who, having missed the Montreal Convention's two- year deadline to sue for injury that occurred in connection with his 2015 Delta Airlines flight to London, wishes now to convince us that his injury actually occurred after his disembarkation and therefore outside the preemptive scope of the Montreal Convention, and is actionable under local law. Our (legal and factual) crosscheck complete, we find that Dagi has failed to show that his injury did not begin inflight and therefore falls within the scope - 2 - of the Convention and is, as a result, time-barred. Seatbelts fastened with chairs in the upright position, we explain. BACKGROUND Dagi, an American citizen and resident of Massachusetts, was a passenger on Delta Flight No. 63 that departed Boston's Logan Airport on March 30, 2015 and arrived at London's Heathrow Airport the next morning. As the plane was descending, Dagi was accused of stealing a crew member's bag. With Dagi's consent, the airlines searched Dagi's carry-on luggage, but came up dry. Later inflight the bag was found elsewhere on the plane, but Dagi was accused of having thrown the bag to the spot of discovery (presumably to avoid being caught). Upon landing, the airline prevented Dagi from deplaning until all other passengers had done so. Quoting the relevant portions of Dagi's complaint: Once the Aircraft landed, the Attendant prevented the Plaintiff from leaving the Aircraft before the other passengers had done so. The Attendant on the Jetway directed the Delta Ground Employee to detain the Plaintiff and to turn ...
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