In Brasil, a mother who was prevented from boarding with her son to Italy will be compensated for moral damages. According to reports, the airline, even after a decision from the Children and Youth Court, denied boarding to the mother and son. Find out more.
Understanding that the case involves a consumer relationship and, therefore, the supplier responds objectively for the service failure in any of its aspects (article 14, caput, of the CDC), the 14th Chamber of Private Law of the Court of Justice of São Paulo ordered an airline to compensate a mother who was prevented from boarding a flight to Italy with her son.
The plaintiff is Brazilian and lives in Italy with her Italian son and husband. She spent a few days in Brazil accompanied by the boy. When trying to board the flight back to Italy, she was stopped by airline employees, who demanded express authorization from her father, due to recent cases of child abduction in the country.
Despite presenting documentation written in Italian, the company did not allow access to the aircraft and required authorization from the father in Portuguese or judicial authorization for boarding. Even after presenting the document obtained at the Children and Youth Court, she was only able to board four days after the scheduled date.
“The question is one of reasonableness. If there is unequivocal proof that the author (Brazilian) and her husband (Italian) are really married and live in Italy and, furthermore, that the child accompanying her is really her son, what is the reason for refusing boarding?”, he stated. the rapporteur, judge Achile Alesina. For him, the airline was unable to prove its allegations that the mother did not present the correct documentation.
The judge highlighted that the mother presented a document issued by the Consulate General of Brazil in Milan, which could not have been denied by the airline. “The situation becomes even more surreal when the decision made by i. magistrate working on duty at the Children and Youth Court, who spoke about the unnecessary need for travel authorization for the minor to return with his mother to his own home”, he added.
Alesina also spoke of the “humiliation” of the author of the action when she saw company employees questioning whether she was the boy’s mother: “What can we say in relation to what the author herself felt, when she found herself under suspicion of attempting to kidnap her own child? son?". Given this, he considered the situation “vexatious”, far beyond a “mere annoyance”, constituting moral damage. The decision was unanimous.
Civil Appeal: 1026246-52.2018.8.26.0562
Source: Consultor Jurídico
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