[nagdu] Cruise Ship Passenger With Service Dog Attacked

[Ginger Kutsch]

Cruise Ship Passenger With Service Dog Attacked  

December 27, 2012 

http://www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=5135

A 59-year-old passenger was forcibly disembarked from 

Royal Caribbean's Vision of the Seas

on December 20 after he attacked another passenger who had a service dog
with him. 

 

Cruise Critic first learned of the assault from Cruise Critic member
Bloemerl who 

posted,

"My heart goes out to our new found friend and his service dog Freedom. He
was viciously attacked late at nite while getting a pizza in the Solarium.
He

was beaten because a man could not respect service dogs and felt Freedom
should not be on board." 

 

Cynthia Martinez, a  Royal Caribbean spokeswoman did confirm that a
59-year-old passenger "engaged in a physical altercation" with a 53-year-old
man who had a service dog but did not comment

on the cause of the altercation. 

 

Only the attacker was disembarked for being in violation of the line's guest
conduct policy, which states "inappropriate or abusive behavior, including
violence, is strictly prohibited."  He was disembarked in St. John's,
Antigua, the same day as the incident, Martinez added. Additionally, the
incident

was reported to local law enforcement in St. John's, as well as to the
Broward Sheriff's Office in Florida, the office for the county in which the
ship is homeported. 

 

Martinez said ship crew would have detained the man had a law enforcement
agency asked them to hold him, but no such request was received. 

 

"Since the ship was in port, it was possible to disembark the guest for the
violation. If the ship would have been out at sea, the guest would have been
held until it was possible to disembark him." 

 

According to Martinez, the victim "sustained minor injuries and was treated
in the ship's medical facility." 

 

But according to Bloemerl, the man was transferred to a Fort Lauderdale
hospital at the conclusion of the sailing to be checked for broken ribs and
possible internal injuries. 

 

At the time of the incident, Vision of the Seas was six days into a 10-night
sailing that departed Port Everglades on December 14. 

 

--by Dori Saltzman, News Editor