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A woman who had fallen asleep on a United Airlines flight from Las Vegas to Virginia was stunned when she awoke to a man touching her breast, federal officials said.
According to court documents, the woman had drifted off on a Christmas Eve flight from Las Vegas McCarran International Airport to Washington Dulles International Airport when she woke up to Ivan Lopez leaning over her “repeatedly rubbing her right breast,” officials said in a statement Wednesday.
The woman yelled “get away from me,” at Lopez, who then got up from his seat and moved to the back of the plane, where officials said he admitted to a flight attendant that he had sexually assaulted the woman.
Lopez, 26, was charged with abusive sexual contact aboard an aircraft in flight. He faces up to two years in prison if convicted.
According to an affidavit obtained by the Miami Herald, the woman told FBI investigators that the touching was “not accidental,” and that Lopez had touched her for around 10 seconds.
After Lopez admitted that he had touched the woman to the flight attendant, he “further stated that he thought he was in trouble and that he was sorry.” The flight attendant told investigators he was quickly moved from the 12th row to the 21st row for the remainder of the flight.
Once moved, he told the attendant “that he had a disability,” and apologized again, according to the affidavit.
Lopez told FBI officials that “he wanted to get the woman’s attention by poking her on her right shoulder, so that he could ask her what she was listening to through her headphones,” and insisted that turbulence caused him to accidentally touch her breast.
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