JetBlue sued for disclosing passenger information to Defense contractor

<br>SALT LAKE CITY (AP) _ A group of passengers has sued JetBlue Airways Corp. for passing their personal information to a Defense Department contractor. <br><br>The suit follows JetBlue's acknowledgment

Tuesday, September 23rd 2003, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) _ A group of passengers has sued JetBlue Airways Corp. for passing their personal information to a Defense Department contractor.

The suit follows JetBlue's acknowledgment last week that it had given information from about 5 million passenger records to Torch Concepts of Huntsville, Ala.

Torch produced a study, ``Homeland Security: Airline Passenger Risk Assessment,'' that was purported to help the government improve military base security.

The class-action lawsuit alleges fraudulent misrepresentation, breach of contract and invasion of privacy.

JetBlue chief executive David Neeleman said Monday that the information contained ``name, address and phone number, along with flight information, but absolutely no payment or credit card information.''

Utah attorney James W. McConkie filed the lawsuit Monday in 3rd District Court on behalf of five named plaintiffs and a representative class, seeking compensatory _ but not punitive _ damages.

``We got the sense that Mr. Neeleman wanted to make this right, so we commented in our lawsuit that we wanted to pursue the matter, but not in a way that would damage the financial viability of the company. It's a good company,'' McConkie said.

JetBlue spokesman Gareth Edmondson-Jones said Monday that he had not seen the lawsuit and was unable to comment.