Three black men, booted off an American Airlines flight to New York, are suing the carrier for racial discrimination, claiming a request to remove them from their flight was due to the colour of their skin.

On Wednesday travellers Alvin Jackson, 27, Emmanuel Jean Joseph and Xavier Veal, 37, filed a lawsuit in a New York District court against American Airlines.

“American Airlines singled us out for being Black, embarrassed us, and humiliated us,” said a joint statement from the plaintiffs.

According to the filing they were among eight men, all with dark skin, asked to disembark the January 5 flight from Phoenix, Arizona – following a “flight attendant’s complaint that an unidentified passenger had body odour.”

Lawyers for Alvin Jackson said the case amounts to discrimination, given the passengers were not seated together and many had already caught a connecting flight without issue.

Law firm Public Citizen filed the allegation that the airline had acted with “blatant and egregious race discrimination” after disembarking all black male passengers from flight 832 over an unsubstantiated complaint.

“Our clients … were not seated together and had never spoken to each other before the flight. Before takeoff, an American Airlines representative approached our clients one by one, skipping over rows of other passengers, and ordered them off the plane without explanation,” said the attorney’s office.

Five other black passengers were also removed from the plane.

After being told they would be booked on to the next service the men objected, saying that there was not another flight until the following day. Eventually the air crew relented and the men were able to get back on the same plane.

The carrier said an internal investigation was still ongoing into the matter, and that the men’s claims “do not reflect our core values or our purpose of caring for peope”.”

In a joint statement the three men said that it was unthinkable that all passengers of a certain racial profile should be removed from a plane over a complaint.

“There is no explanation other than the colour of our skin. American Airlines singled us out for being Black, embarrassed us, and humiliated us. Clearly, this was discrimination.”

The men are now seeking compensation and punitive damages against the carrier.

In a statement American Airlines said it was taking the allegations very seriously.

“We take all claims of discrimination very seriously and want our customers to have a positive experience when they choose to fly with us.”

The carrier said an internal investigation was still ongoing into the matter, and that the men’s claims “do not reflect our core values or our purpose of caring for people.”