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Ryan Manuella, 30, "moved to a vacant seat next to a female passenger and touched the passenger without her consent" on a flight from Denver on April 16, 2021, U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger said.
Manuella -- of the Erie County town of Cheektowaga, just northeast of Buffalo -- didn't know the woman, according to a complaint on file in U.S. District Court in Newark.
The victim then yelled at him and left the row of seats, Sellinger said.
Manuella took a deal from the government rather than risk the possible outcome of a trial. He pleaded guilty in federal court in Newark on Tuesday, June 20, to assault with the intent to commit another felony -- namely, stalking -- while on an airplane.
U.S. District Judge Susan D. Wigenton scheduled sentencing for Nov. 1.
Records show Manuella was charged with a domestic violence assault in 2020.
Three years earlier, he got into a struggle in 2017 with a private security guard who later died of a heart attack during at an event in Lancaster, NY, authorities said.
Police determined that the attack wasn’t related to the scuffle and charged Manuella with harassment, records show.
Sellinger credited special agents of the FBI and officers of the Port Authority Police Department with the investigation leading to Tuesday's plea, secured by Assistant U.S. Attorneys DeNae M. Thomas and Katherine M. Romano of his Health Care Fraud Unit in Newark.
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