Southwest Airlines' Half Hearted Apology to Kyla Ebbert on the Dr. Phil Show.

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) September 18, 2007 -- Kyla Ebbert (http://www.martinreedlaw.com), her Los Angeles attorney, Martin S. Reed (http://www.martinreedlaw.com) and Kyla's mother, Michele, appeared today on the Dr. Phil (http://www.drphil.com) show. During the taping of the show, Southwest Airlines' CEO, Gary C. Kelly, issued to Dr. Phil his apology to Kyla which was read to Kyla while on air. Mr. Kelly, in his attempt to be humorous, poked fun at Kyla and not Southwest Airlines.

'Southwest Airlines was insincere in its apology to Kyla,' according to Reed. 'Would they have used phrases such as "the publicity caught us with our pants down" and "this story has such great legs" if it was serious about righting this wrong?'

Immediately following this apology, Southwest Airlines announced its miniskirt fares spinning and trivializing this matter. Nevertheless, Kyla was gracious in her acceptance of the apology but returned to Dr. Phil the two airline tickets presented to her by Southwest Airlines confirming her initial desire to receive a sincere apology from Southwest Airlines and the implementation of procedures by Southwest Airlines which will help prevent the recurrence of this type of incident.

However, Kyla was thrilled to accept a free ticket from a representative of Virgin America, Abby Lunardini, director of corporate communications for Virgin, who made it clear to Kyla that they would love to have her fly on their airline in the future. When asked if Kyla would bring legal action against Southwest Airlines, her attorney, Martin S. Reed, pointed out to Dr. Phil that "Kyla has been on 10 to 15 shows and it took Southwest Airlines well over 2 months to apologize."

Furthermore as reported in the Los Angeles Times, Mr. Kelly insists that Southwest Airlines had apologized to Kyla in August. This is simply not the case says Reed. The day before the apology was presented on the Dr. Phil show, the President of Southwest Airlines, Coleen Barrett, as featured speaker at Texas Christian University, defended the actions of its employee and she is further quoted as saying Southwest Airlines won't likely apologize to Kyla. She concluded by saying that Southwest Airlines continues its culture of putting its employees first and trusting them to make appropriate decisions as with the scenario involving Kyla. In other words, leaving the door open to have this happen again. "Apparently Ms. Barrett does not believe the customer comes first," says Reed.

Martin S. Reed may be reached for comment at his Los Angeles office:

Martin S. Reed

Anker, Reed, Hymes, Schreiber & Cohen

1901 Avenue of the Stars

11th Floor

Los Angeles, California 90067

Telephone: 310 286-7100

Facsimile: 310 286-7120

Email: msreed@msreedlaw.com

http://www.martinreedlaw.com

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