On January 29, 2025, an American Airlines aircraft crashed into a U.S. Black Hawk helicopter in a freak accident. All 67 passengers aboard the plane perished, including a group of competitive figure skaters returning from U.S. National Figure Skating Camp. One of its p
assengers included 30-year-old Kiah Duggins, a civil rights attorney and a former beauty pageant contestant for Miss Kansas, in a disastrous in-flight crash over the Potomac River.
A native of Wichita, Kansas, Kiah Duggins distinguished herself academically and professionally early in life. She finished high school through Wichita East High School’s International Baccalaureate Program and then continued at Wichita State University, earning a Clay Barton Scholarship. Her quest for justice landed her at Harvard Law School, and she became a first in a long succession when she became a President of a Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, working for disenfranchised communities.
Duggins concentrated her practice in civil rights law. She handled cases about unjust bail regimes and unconstitutionality in policing in Tennessee, Texas, and Washington, D.C. She was a senior principal at the Civil Rights Corps and played a key role in shaping policy reform. She even prepared to join a new role at Howard University’s School of Law in Fall 2025, where she hoped to shape future generations of civil rights attorneys.
Her work reached out of courtrooms, as well. Locally, she struggled for environmental justice in Wichita, raising awareness and holding responsible contaminated groundwater in predominantly minority communities. Though professionally inclined towards a career in law, Duggins pursued a secondary interest in pageantry. In 2014, she won the title of Butler County’s Miss and then entered the competition in the Miss Kansas pageant, in which she placed in the top ten. She used pageantry as a tool for social justice, challenging and urging young women to seek leadership roles.
The plane crashed during her return to Washington, D.C., having gone to Wichita, where she saw her mother, who received a surgical intervention. Her trip took place at a most timely period, with her birthday, a big occasion, almost at its doorstep, and she planned to celebrate it with family and friends.
Colleagues, family, and friends remember Duggins as a tireless and unafraid campaigner for justice.
“Kiah was a brave and lovely person who died in an attempt to make the world a brighter and safer community,”
a fellow co-worker added. Her dad exhibited profound bereavement, stating that she was their
“beauty and successful firstborn”
and requesting a period of quiet during this testing time.
Her work will live on in lives she touched, policies altered, and students whom she would have mentored. Kiah Duggins was not merely a beauty pageant contestant, an activist, and a lawyer—she was a catalyst for change, and her presence will echo for years to come.
