A white foster father traveling with two Hispanic teenage girls—whom he has legal guardianship over—says he was wrongly accused of child sex trafficking by a United Airlines flight attendant, triggering an invasive police investigation and public humiliation.
Jim Niven, a longtime foster parent, was flying from Costa Rica to Colorado on July 2 with two Colombian girls, aged 13 and 15, when the flight crew alerted authorities. Upon landing in Denver, he says he was interrogated by police in front of passengers, as the girls watched in confusion and fear.
“It was humiliating. It was traumatic. And it was unjust,” Niven wrote in a powerful social media post condemning United Airlines for what he described as racial profiling and a failure of basic human decency.
According to Niven, the girls had previously been adopted by an American family, who later relinquished custody. Niven and his wife, who live in Costa Rica, were appointed temporary guardians and are now pursuing adoption. He said the girls are already U.S. citizens, and have traveled with the Niven family multiple times, often using United Airlines.
Despite this, a United flight attendant accused Niven of drugging and trafficking the girls, allegedly based solely on the fact that the girls didn’t speak English and looked different from their guardian. Niven believes the flight crew failed to take any reasonable steps to verify their suspicions before reporting him.
“They didn’t check travel records. They didn’t ask questions. They didn’t try to translate. If they had, they would have seen these same children have traveled with me before, often on United flights,” he wrote.
Niven—who has fostered over 50 children and adopted three, including two from China—said the incident is part of a broader issue of bias and ignorance around nontraditional, multiracial families.
“Being a white guardian to Latina children is not a crime. Being a multiracial family is not suspicious. And assuming otherwise is dangerous,” he said.
“This was racial profiling—driven by ignorance, a lack of linguistic awareness, and the toxic belief that families must racially match to be legitimate.”
Upon arrival in Colorado, officers from the Denver Police Department and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) investigated the claim. Authorities confirmed no crime had been committed.
“CBP takes accusations of human trafficking seriously,” a spokesman told the Denver Post. “But the accusations were unfounded.”
Despite the traumatic experience, Niven said United Airlines refused to apologize or issue a refund, claiming their crew was simply following protocol.
“Your crew failed them. Your corporate response failed them. And your so-called protocol is broken,” Niven wrote in his post, which has since gone viral.
In a brief public statement, United Airlines later claimed that a follow-up apology was made to the family. However, Niven disputes this, saying he has yet to receive any direct apology or accountability.
He also criticized United’s implication that Costa Rican authorities would allow a trafficking situation to unfold on their watch.
“Suggesting that Costa Rican immigration and airport security would permit an adult to fly internationally with unrelated minors in a trafficking case is insulting—to them, and to us.”
Niven and his family had been flying to Denver to visit three of their adult children in Colorado for the summer. He says this incident has not only traumatized the girls, but has also exposed just how flawed airline protocols are when it comes to handling interracial and multilingual families.
“Our family is not a typical one, and we are proud of that,” Niven said.
“But if this is how United treats loving, legal guardians traveling with their children—based solely on skin color and language—we have a much bigger problem than just bad customer service.”
As public outrage grows, many are calling on United Airlines to reform their procedures, offer transparency, and train staff on bias and diversity awareness—before another innocent family is dragged through the same ordeal.