Flying Lawyer (edit - whose post has now disappeared!) - a threat to unlawfully imprison a plane load of people would get even the most well behaved bunch of passengers protesting loudly, and if this turns out to be the case isn't there something in law about prevention of a greater crime being a sufficient reason to commit a smaller one? I'm thinking of the women protestors who broke into BAe and smashed up some Hawks for instance.
Naturally the majority here are believing without question the cabin crew account but faced with a large number of people testifying to the opposite, you really think any conviction could be gained?
The earlier remarks in this thread about "photographic evidence of our crew members' injury (taken for evidence by the police) to prove the seriousness of the assault" made me think open wounds, gushing blood, broken bones etc. and now it turns out to be a bruise that needed no medical attention. Lacking video evidence and in the face of multiple eye witnesses saying otherwise, do you seriously think a prosecution for assault would stand a chance?
Yes, it IS a serious assault in that no one on the aircraft should expect any injury of any sort from another person but overblowing the injury doesn't help the media scrum or the general belief among most of the public that this incident was effectively caused by poor decision making by the cabin crew rather than rioting football hooligans as was initially publicised. The talksport thing shows just how this is being played out to the public at large.
The industry will never manage to educate passengers as to acceptable behaviour if it persists with the holier than thou attitude displayed on this thread, no matter how legally correct that attitude is.
As a passenger, I've seen FAs react quite nastily to innocuous questions and I can well imagine how such responses could take a situation well past the point of safety and into headline territory - something happening with the people management training? Had I been on the flight, I'd have been delighted to be on the ground at Cardiff in one bit if there was even the slightest doubt at the aircraft's continued safety, but I would not be in the least surprised to find the rest of the cabin in uproar about it.