No, that's standard. Normal procedure is that they'd have a count of present passengers based on how many people have checked in. Before boarding the plane, the

No, that's standard. Normal procedure is that they'd have a count of present passengers based on how many people have checked in. Before boarding the plane, they'd say "we need 4 seats, and we'll pay X amount (and possibly hotel) to have volunteers take the flight take the flight tomorrow". If they don't get the volunteers, then 4 people just won't be allowed to board, and the airline pays them, and puts them up until the next available flight. The airline isn't going to delay another flight because they couldn't get a flight crew there in time; they find a way to get the flight crew there. In this case, they screwed up procedure and boarded everyone first. Then they screwed up again and had someone assaulted by armed goons in front of a few hundred people.