s
Suggested Reading
One Black man's fight or flight instincts kicked in during a brutal fight on a Frontier airplane. But despite the man being cleared of any wrongdoing, viral footage of the beatdown drew negative reactions from folks falsely painting him as the aggressor. Now, he's setting the record straight.
“What I hate is that the video doesn’t capture what started the whole thing, you know?” passenger Keanu Evans told WSVN. “It only captures me defending myself.” According to Evans, the fight broke out between him and another man, Ishaan Sharma, for no reason.
During a flight from Philadelphia to Miami, Evans was seated in front of Sharma. But soon, he noticed something was off about the man. "He was doing some, like, dark laugh like, 'ha ha ha ha ha,'" Evans claimed. "And he was saying things like, 'You puny mortal man. If you challenge me, it will result in your death.'"
Evans left his seat after that initial encounter to use the restroom. On his way there, he stopped a flight attendant and voiced his concerns about the man. In response, they said if the harassment continued, he should press the button for assistance. The Black man returned to his seat, but that's when things took a scary turn.
"He kept threatening me with death," Evans continued. "That’s what made me get up and press the button above me. And I just turned around and I looked at him and I responded to him." This allegedly prompted Sharma to challenge Evans by putting his forehead against his. And as you can expect, things only escalated further.
"He just grabs me by the throat and just starts choking me," Evans recalled. "At that moment it was, you know, fight or flight responses kick in. I’m in a tight, confined space on an aircraft, and all I can do is just defend myself."
And Evans did just that. Video taken by other passengers on the plane show Evans putting the paws on Sharma, clearly winning the fight. Meanwhile, other folks on the plane can be heard begging the men to break it up. "Let him go," one passenger demanded. "Stop, let him go."
This didn't do much to stop the ball from rolling, however. Even flight attendants had a hard time breaking the two men up. Eventually, the brawl ended, and according to video and Sharma's mugshot, he got the brunt of it all.
"If you see on my face, I’ve got some scratches from him scratching me on this right hand side," Evans told WSVN. But compared to Sharma, who had a black eye, busted lip and several cuts and bruises on his body, Evans was the clear victor. Sharma was quickly identified as the aggressor, and once the plane landed in Miami, police were waiting to scoop him up.
According to reports, Sharma has been charged with battery. But despite justice being on Evans' side, folks online came up with their own narratives. "I hear you provoke that men all the time during [the flight]," one person on TikTok responded to Evans, who took to the app to share his side of the story.
"That's not the truth," Evans clapped back. "I've been getting a lot of hate speech. I've been getting a lot of negative comments, but I'm also getting a lot of overwhelming support."
Attorneys for Sharma claimed the he was "meditating" and Evans was "upset" by the silent practice, which sparked the fight between them, according to the Daily Mail. "My client is from a religion where he was meditating," defense attorney Renee Gordon said. "Unfortunately, the passenger behind him did not like that."
Sharma remains in custody in Miami. Frontier Airlines has not commented on the brawl.
Straight From 
Sign up for our free daily newsletter.