I flew a couple of domestic sectors with Egypt Air once. They had free seating, and on the first sector, I quickly realised that my 6 foot 3 inch frame simply could not fit into their standard pitch, which was probably 28" but seemed even shorter. So on the second sector, my wife and I made an undisguised, elbows to the fore run to be first on board and get the emergency exit seats, which had marginally more legroom.
A flight attendant stood in front of the third seat beside me as the rest of the pax boarded and then gave it up to an American tourist who was, without exaggeration, at least 450 lbs. I was left sitting at an angle of 45 degrees, as much in the seat space my wife was occuppying as in my own.
I called the FA and said the pax beside me would not fit through the emergency exit, so if we had a problem, no one would get out through that exit except my wife and I, who were the only ones closer to the exit than the American. Her answer was logical in the extreme. "He will not fit in any other seat." End of argument.
I spent a very uncomfortable 40 minutes watching my travelling companion eat non stop the whole time, taking four of everything on offer from the FA as well as dipping repeatedly into his rucksack betwen complaining about how hot the aircraft was.
Courts need to face the fact that modern airliners are made to fit ONLY the 95 percentile human being, and if someone from the other 5 percentile is unable to fit into the space they have purchased without intruding into the space some other hapless traveller has purchased, they need to face facts and pay for the space they NEED. Some might say I should pay extra myself, as I fit into that "other" 5 percentile myself, but not to the point where I intrude into the space of other passengers, except for my knees sticking into their backs when I am unable to have them out in the aisle.
End of rant.