Netherlands man arrested at Salt Lake airport for unruly behavior on plane

SALT LAKE CITY — A Netherlands man, with residency in the United States, was arrested for assault and interference with a flight crew on Jan. 21 at the Salt Lake City International Airport after allegedly behaving in an unruly and abusive way on a flight.

The incident took place on a flight from Amsterdam Airport Schiphol in the Netherlands, which landed at the Salt Lake City airport. According to court documents, Darnel Silver Collins was involved in verbal outbursts, as well as allegedly following other passengers on the plane and created a potentially unsafe environment.

The document also states that Collins repeatedly followed and touched a woman, identified as “Passenger 2” in the document, and escalated to the point that Collins was pushed away. Collins then approached another woman as she was coming out of the restroom, and “physically grabbed onto (her) arm and did not release her until another Passenger and/or flight crew intervened,” the charging document states.

Flight attendants also intervened after Collins became verbally abusive.

“This interaction became aggressive enough at one point that Flight Attendant 1 felt as though the altercation was going to (become) physical and intervened,” the document states. Collins was then moved to the rearmost row of seats on the aircraft. Collins then got up from his seat and approached a flight attendant.

“Hey (expletive), you speaking up now?” Collins said.

According to the charging document, “(Flight Attendant) felt unsafe but was grateful there was a cart between them because if not, she felt he could have reached out to her.”

“Collins continued to unbuckle his seat belt and stand up and cause problems, even after being physically restrained to the point where three seat belt extenders were connected to put around his mid-section to keep him seated for the remainder of the flight,” the document stated.

On Wednesday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah announced that a grand jury returned an indictment against Collins, charging him with several federal charges, including the interference of a flight crew.

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