Gold Star family calls fellow fliers who booed them ‘classless’

Devastated by his son’s death from a bombing in Afghanistan, Stewart Perry said his anguish was overcome by anger when impatient first-class passengers booed his family because they were allowed to exit a plane ahead of them to catch a connecting flight to meet the soldier’s remains.

“I was really shocked that adult men and women — from elderly to mid-20s — would behave that way,” said Perry, a former Marine who lives in Stockton.

The Perry family’s painful journey to meet the body of Army Sgt. John Perry started Nov. 14 when they boarded an American Airlines flight to Arizona at Sacramento International Airport.

The flight captain announced over the aircraft intercom that passengers should remain seated to allow for a “military family” to deplane first because they “have an important place to go,” Perry said.

Perry’s son — a member of the Army’s 1st Cavalry Division from Fort Hood, Texas — was one of two soldiers killed Nov. 12 when a suicide bomber attacked the Bagram Airfield, in the Parwan Province of Afghanistan.

“We will always make every possible effort to ensure a smooth journey in such difficult circumstances,” Ross Feinsten, a spokesman for the airlines, said in a statement Monday to The Chronicle.

American Airlines made sure the family caught their connecting flight to Philadelphia, holding the plane at the gate for them for 40 minutes, Perry said.

Perry said the passengers on his connecting flight were considerate and kind when he boarded with his family.

John Perry was “quiet and respectful,” Stewart Perry recalled, adding that he had a love for fishing and hosted his own fishing channel on YouTube called “Fishing on Base.”