Family speaks out after death of Southwest flight attendant Jenny Lupton in Hawaii

Southwest Airlines flight attendant Jenny Lupton was found dead at the Hilton Hawaiian Village in Waikiki on Thursday, Aug. 20, but her family says it did not hear from the Honolulu Police Department until Monday, four days later.

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The Honolulu medical examiner attempted to notify the family of Jenny’s death Thursday at 12:20 p.m. Hawaii time, but Lupton’s niece Hannah Lupton told SFGATE the Oklahoma family did not see the message until Friday morning. “My mom got the call from a medical examiner that Jenny had passed. For my mom, it was extremely difficult. Jenny was my mom’s little sister, and my mother was right above Jenny within the line of their siblings,” she said. “… It was and still is extremely hard for her, and shocking.”

Hannah then passed the news on to family and friends. “Everyone was a potential best friend for Jenny. Even if you were, you know, you’ve only met her a couple times, it hit really everyone pretty hard,” she said.

The family tried to reach the police department the same day they found out, Hannah said, but they did not hear from them until days later.

“It was a state holiday in Hawaii, so we were having a hard time getting ahold of anyone,” Hannah Lupton told SFGATE by phone from Oklahoma. Aug. 21 was Statehood Day in Hawaii. “HPD did not contact us until Monday the 24th.”

Hannah said the lack of information, and that no one from the police department had contacted the family, prompted her to reach out to the Oklahoma attorney general for help.

“We had such a lack of information from everyone for several days,” she said.

By then, the news of Jenny’s death had begun to spread, along with public speculation that Jenny had died by suicide.

Hannah said the family felt it needed to advocate for Jenny. “We wanted to stress that she was not suicidal, and we do not believe it was suicide, especially with a timeline of things and the conversations we had just hours before,” she said.

Oklahoma Attorney General’s Office spokesperson Shauna Peters said in an emailed statement to SFGATE that the office is in contact with the family and Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez’s office “to help ensure a proper investigation” for a family “who deserve to have answers about this tragedy.”

SFGATE reached out to the Honolulu Police Department about the timing. “There was no unnecessary delay in contacting the family. The process required positive identification of the decedent, followed by the Medical Examiner’s Office locating and notifying the appropriate next of kin before HPD investigators contacted the family regarding the investigation,” Honolulu Police Department spokesperson Noreen Reimel told SFGATE in an email.

Hannah said that communication with police has improved since Monday. “It seems like they’re taking it pretty seriously at this point,” she said. “… We do believe now that the Honolulu Police Department is working diligently to find out what happened and give us information.” 

That same day, Honolulu Police Department also sent out a news release saying it opened an unattended death investigation on Aug. 20: “HPD Homicide Detail is actively investigating the circumstances surrounding the death and is working closely with her family.” Police also said that no conclusions have been made about the manner of death.

“All we know for fact is that there was a fall from her hotel balcony,” Hannah said. “Other than that, we don’t know if she was passed beforehand. We don’t know if it happened from the fall. So we’re waiting for that information. Our family does believe, though, that it was not suicidal, so we are worried that there was foul play involved, either that or just a freak accident.”

The hours before Jenny was found

Meanwhile, the family is also piecing together Jenny’s night out. Hannah said Jenny had been in contact with family and co-workers in the hours before her death. She had gone dancing, gotten a hibiscus tattoo and messaged relatives about her night.

“She had been texting prior in the day, talking about having fun and going dancing with friends, and that she was really excited,” Hannah said.

Hannah said the bar Jenny visited was about a mile from the Hilton. Since Jenny’s death, people have reached out to Hannah who said they were there and spoke to Jenny. “She was having a good time, had good conversations,” Hannah said, “so nothing abnormal.”

The last text Jenny’s family received from her arrived at 4:40 a.m. Aug. 20, in Oklahoma, which was 11:40 p.m., Aug. 19, in Hawaii.

After that, Hannah said, Jenny returned to the Hilton Hawaiian Village and texted fellow flight attendants on the trip, asking about plans for the following day. “Like they had plans for the next day, and that was when she had, you know, gotten back to the hotel and she had texted them, ‘Hey, what are the plans for tomorrow.’”

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What happened after remains unknown. Honolulu Emergency Services responded to the area Aug. 20 at 7:15 a.m., and pronounced the patient deceased at the scene, according to Honolulu EMS spokesperson Shayne Enright.

When asked about the state of Jenny’s hotel room, Hannah said that the police have not given many details. But the family has been told her belongings in the bathroom “looked like she was getting ready to go out,” and that the patio furniture on Jenny’s balcony had not been moved, Hannah said.

“The patio furniture was not moved, so she wouldn’t have been able to climb on that, and that’s another thing that shows us it’s not a suicide,” Hannah said. “And the railing of the balcony is pretty high. And Jenny is not a very tall person, she’s 5-1.”

Remembering Jenny 

For Hannah, those final hours are only a fraction of Jenny’s story.

“Jenny was the type of person that if you met her, you were never going to forget her — not her personality or her face,” Hannah said.

“She was a mom and she loved being a mom before anything else in life. And she loved being a sister, an aunt, a daughter. Family was extremely important to her,” she added. “She loved life,” she said.

Lupton had three siblings and a large extended family of nieces and nephews. Hannah said her aunt made a point of being present in their lives, showing up for sporting events and other milestones.

“She loved life. She loved traveling. She was a sports fanatic,” Hannah said. She rooted for the Chicago Bears, among many others, and also loved gardening and spending time with her cat.

Lupton was a flight attendant for 29 years, with 26 years at Southwest Airlines.

“She loved being a flight attendant. She made many, many friends throughout, and that was a lifelong career,” Hannah said.

That love of the job also influenced Hannah, who became a flight attendant herself. Jenny helped her apply, prepared her for interviews and later pinned Hannah at her graduation ceremony. The two eventually got to fly with each other several times.

“I saw how fun Jenny’s life was and her career, and that she was able to balance a lot of family time along with her job that was a lot of fun,” Hannah said.

Hawaii was Jenny’s “destination of choice,” Hannah said. She’d been traveling there for decades and knew Waikiki well, and had stayed at the Hilton Hawaiian Village before.

“She loved the ocean. She loved the people there,” Hannah said. “It was kind of her happy place.”

Since Monday, Hannah said the Honolulu Police Department has reached out again. “They have let us know that they’re doing a thorough investigation, and that they’re not going to rule anything out,” she said, adding that investigators told the family they would provide updates once they had more definitive information.

“We’re just hoping that we can find answers soon,” she said.

This story has been updated.

Editor’s note: SFGATE recognizes the importance of diacritical marks in the Hawaiian language. We are unable to use them due to the limitations of our publishing platform.

If you are in distress, call the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline 24 hours a day at 988, or visit 988lifeline.org for more resources.