A mother was shopping with her two children and was waiting in the customer service line to return some items she had purchased. One of her children put the shopping bag on the counter, although there was disagreement as to whether the child threw it down or placed it there. The sales associate behind the counter jumped back and said “don’t hurt me.” When the mother asked why the sales associate had said that, he replied that there could be something in the bag that might hurt him, such as a knife. The mother asked the associate if he was behaving like this because she was wearing a hijab.
The interaction at the store caused one of the children to become extremely distraught. There was a disagreement between the parties as to what actually happened during the exchange, and a manager was called. The manager apologized to the mother and told her not to let the experience stop her from shopping there in the future. She later called the store to complain, but was unhappy with the way her complaint was handled. After the incident, one of her children had nightmares and needed ongoing medical treatment.
The HRLSC negotiated a settlement that included:
- financial compensation for the discrimination;
- the personal respondent writing a letter of regret about the incident and reaffirmed the employer’s commitment to uphold the Human Rights Code; and
- the personal respondent taking the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s on-line training ‘Human Rights 101’ and confirming its completion with the HRLSC’s legal counsel, and training all staff on non-discriminatory practices.