Denny’s Restaurants to Pay $54 Million in Race Bias Suits
ORGINAL STORY Published: May 25, 1994
WASHINGTON, May 24— Denny’s, a national restaurant chain, agreed today to pay more than $54 million to settle lawsuits filed by thousands of black customers who had been refused service or had been forced to wait longer or pay more than white customers.
The new head of the civil rights division of the Justice Department, Deval L. Patrick, said it was the largest and broadest settlement under the Federal public-accommodation laws. Those laws were adopted more than 30 years ago to end segregation in restaurants and other places that serve the public.
The agreement, worked out among Government lawyers and lawyers representing Denny’s and its customers, ended Federal class-action lawsuits in Baltimore and in San Jose, Calif., and a complaint in Virginia. Those actions were filed on behalf of thousands of black customers who had asserted that Denny’s violated their civil rights by treating them rudely and by routinely giving preferential treatment to whites.
In one instance, a black Federal judge from Houston and his wife who had been traveling for 18 hours said they were forced to wait at a Denny’s in Yreka, Calif., for almost an hour as white teen-agers taunted them and referred to them as “niggers.”
In another case, six black Secret Service agents assigned to President Clinton’s detail were refused a table at a Denny’s in Annapolis. Md., while their white Secret Service colleagues were seated and served.
For more than three years Denny’s, a subsidiary of Flagstar Companies of Spartanburg, S.C., has been the target of growing complaints that its restaurants segregated blacks or required them to pre-pay or make various payments not required of white patrons.
The company denied that it had a policy of discrimination, but it nonetheless promised to take immediate steps to prevent shabby treatment of its black customers.
Some executives said they feared the publicity had begun to discourage blacks, who represent 10 percent of the chain’s customers, from eating at the 1,500 Denny’s restaurants. In all, more than 4,300 claims were filed as part of the class-action suits asserting that the company had treated black customers worse than whites.
Under today’s settlement, how much each customer receives from Denny’s will depend on how many people come forward within the next few months.
In addition to the cash payment and the promise to improve its treatment of blacks, the company agreed to hire Sharon Lybeck Hartmann, a Los Angeles lawyer with a background in civil rights, to enforce the consent decree and to monitor any civil rights problems that may arise. It also promised to begin a program in which blacks posing as customers would investigate whether Denny’s restaurants were discriminating.
“With today’s action, the message is clear: there will be a high price to pay for unlawful indignities, and the Justice Department will exact that price wherever the law is violated,” Mr. Patrick said. “Unfair standards employed by restaurants must no longer be standard fare.”
The settlements also suggested that after more than a year without a leader, the civil rights division at the Justice Department may be beginning a more active period. The division suffered a bruising political setback when President Clinton withdrew the nomination of Lani Guinier last year to head the division. Mr. Clinton left the position vacant for the first 15 months of his Administration.
Through much of the last year, the division also faced criticism from New York Democrats and Republicans for its handling of its investigation into the 1991 disturbances in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn.
Moreover, today’s settlements reflected a revived partnership between civil rights and Government lawyers that had disappeared during the Reagan and Bush Administrations.
The two Federal suits settled today had been filed under Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which is known as the Public Accommodations Act. The law was often used in the 1960’s and 70’s to eliminate lingering segregation problems, but in the last decade it has not been widely cited.
Last year another restaurant chain, Shoney’s, agreed to pay $105 million to thousands of black employees and job applicants to settle a discrimination case, but that case did not involve customers or the public-accommodations law.
Lawyers for some of the black customers said today that they had begun to uncover evidence that the thousands of cases were not random but reflected a pervasive attitude of discrimination that permeated Denny’s management.
“We believe that there was, at the company, an attitude that went into the management level, but we don’t know exactly how high,” said John Relman, a lawyer for the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights. “This attitude at the company, at the management level and working its way down, had the effect of causing discriminatory attitudes going down to the lowest levels of the company.” Training to Deal WIth Blacks
Another lawyer, Mari Mayeda, said that during pretrial fact-finding a former manager had testified about training sessions in which managers were told how to deal with what was considered too many blacks in a restaurant at one time. Ms. Mayeda said the company’s code word for such occasions was a “blackout.”
But Jerome J. Richardson, the chairman and chief executive of Flagstar, denied that there was any policy to discriminate against blacks.
“These settlements are not an admission that Denny’s has had a policy or practice of discrimination against African Americans,” he said. At a news conference in Washington, he sought to portray the incidents as random and not part of a corporate strategy.
“We serve one million customers a day at Denny’s and we have 40,000 employees,” Mr. Richardson said. “It would be naive on my part to say that customers are always satisfied.”
Within the last year, Mr. Richardson said, the company has taken significant steps to prevent discrimination at its restaurants, including training and random checking. It has also hired Norman J. Hill, a black executive, to head its human resources department.
But the portrait of the chain presented by some customers today suggested that it had been plagued by racial problems.
Kristina Ridgeway was 17 years old when she walked into a Denny’s in San Jose in 1991 with 17 other teen-agers after attending a college forum sponsored by the San Jose chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. The restaurant demanded a cover charge in addition to a prepayment for the meal, even though several white classmates did not have to make such payments.
“I was very upset,” Ms. Ridgeway said. “Both my parents are from the South and they had to grow up with this kind of thing, and they would always tell me that I wouldn’t have to deal with stuff like this.”
In another case in California, Rachel Thompson recalled how Denny’s offered a free meal for anyone on a birthday and how she had brought proof of her 13th birthday to a family gathering in Vallejo. The restaurant refused to accept a baptismal certificate with Rachel’s date of birth on it.
“They just said that wasn’t enough and made a big scene,” she said. “I felt embarrassed. It was humiliating because other families in there were looking at us, and I guess they thought we were some kind of bad criminals.”
And some incidents occurred as recently as last year, even as the company was trying to resolve accusations of discrimination.
In April 1993, Denny’s agreed as part of a consent decree to settle a Federal suit in California to take steps to end discrimination. But the same day it entered that consent decree, the Denny’s in Annapolis refused to serve the six black Secret Service agents. They later sued in Federal court in Baltimore, and the case in California was reopened.
Federal judges in Baltimore and San Jose must approve the settlement before it takes effect, a process that lawyers said should be completed this summer.
Once approved, the customers will receive $46 million and their lawyers will share another $8.7 million. Any money left over will be donated to the United Negro College Fund and to other nonprofit organizations dedicated to furthering civil rights.
The case should not have a big effect on Flagstar’s bottom line. Denny’s had revenues of $1.53 billion in 1993, and the parent company, Flagstar, owns more than 500 Hardee’s franchises, as well as as the El Pollo Loco and Quincy’s Family Steakhouse chains.
In over-the-counter trading, the stock of Flagstar closed today at $9.50, down 37.5 cents in light trading.
Last July, Denny’s reached an agreement with the N.A.A.C.P. to spend $1 billion in jobs and contracts for minorities over seven years. The company now has no franchises owned by a black, although an executive said 28 applications are “in the final stages of the review process.”
Photo: The parent of Denny’s restaurants, Flagstar Companies, has agreed to pay $54 million to settle racial-discrimination suits filed by blacks. Tom Pfister, front left, a Flagstar lawyer, spoke at a news conference yesterday in Washington, where he was joined by Eric Montgomery, front center, another Flagstar lawyer, and Jerome J. Richardson, right, the company’s chairman and chief executive. (Paul Hosefros/The New York Times) (pg. A18)
BUSTED: Denny’s employees fired for making black patrons pay before eating — but not white customers
According to the Tri-City Herald, a white couple were sitting in the Federal Way all-night restaurant when they witnessed the confrontation with the husband posting what he saw on Facebook.
In his Facebook post, Palmer Pelham states he and his wife were having a “date night” in the nearly empty restaurant when some young black men entered.
“A few minutes after we sat down four young African American Men walk in to eat,” Pelham recalled. “They have to wait about 10 minutes even though the restaurant is empty to be seated. Two other single white men come in and are seated immediately. My wife and I order and our server goes back to kitchen. Finally she go over the table of the young men and takes their orders. She brings our food out and we start eating. The server comes out of the back about 5 minutes later and walks over the the young men’s table with their order slips. She…
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Rivera scoffs in the face of San Juan mayor to back up Trump
SIGH WOW Geraldo
Fox News correspondent Geraldo Rivera grilled San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz on Sunday after President Donald Trump attacked her on Twitter for complaining about his government’s response to Hurricane Maria.Trump lashed out at Cruz in a series of tweets over the weekend after she pleaded in an interview for him to “save us from dying.”
“Such poor leadership ability by the Mayor of San Juan,” he tweeted angrily.
On Sunday, Rivera seemed to take Trump’s…..
“He who has eyes will be able to see it. He who has an open heart will be able to feel it. Those that prefer to be blinded to injustice that is their issue I have no time for that.”
San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbRF2KtdLEY
Here’s the real story behind the viral photo that had so many judging this mom
Smartphones have a double edge sward. Maybe we need to start suing folks who take our picture and or record without our permission. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT! IF THE PICTURE TAKING OR RECORDING IDOT DOESN’T HAVE THE MONEY YOU CAN’T SUE ANYWAY. I do feel for this woman though.
It’s been over a year since a photo of Molly Lensing, taken without her permission, first went viral. Still, the Illinois mom-of-three says the image continues to haunt her.
The photo was captured in a Colorado airport in 2016, where Lensing and her youngest daughter, Anastasia, then 2 months old, were attempting to return home after visiting family. In the image, Lensing looks at her cell-phone screen while her infant rests on a blanket on the airport floor…..
READ MORE: https://www.today.com/parents/mom-shamed-photo-her-her-baby-airport-t116843
Semen-contaminated flutes might have been given to children, California school officials warn
#LiveAt11: Multiple SoCal school district officials say a music teacher gave flutes/recorders to students contaminated with bodily fluids. pic.twitter.com/sii5IIMU6u
— Veronica Miracle (@vmiracleCNN) September 30, 2017
Several school districts in Southern California warned parents this weekend that flutes and recorders given to children through a nonprofit music program may have been contaminated with bodily fluids. At least one district specified that those fluids could have been semen.
Local, state and federal agencies were investigating a male music teacher who visited schools in Southern California through a program called Flutes Across the World, according to updates from the Saugus Union School District, which serves the Santa Clarita area.
“The performer distributes a flutelike musical instrument made of PVC pipe or bamboo to students during a music lesson, and the allegation is that he contaminated some of these instruments with semen,” Saugus Union Superintendent Joan Lucid said in an email to parents on Saturday. “These allegations are deeply concerning, and I realize they raise many questions.”
The California Department of Justice and the U.S. Postal Service were among the agencies investigating the program, the district said. Lucid said children were never alone with the music specialist, who was not a district employee.
The Saugus district urged students who had an instrument from the Flutes Across the World program to place it inside a paper bag and contact the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Office.
At least 13 school districts in Southern California were potentially affected, the Los Angeles Unified School District said in a statement. LAUSD spokeswoman Shannon Haber said one school in the….
Couple Snapchats Themselves Shooting Up Neighborhood
Here is an example of dumb crimes. Cops in Houston Texas are trying to identify a couple who was responsible for shooting into a west Houston neighborhood.
The snaps were found by a user on Reddit called “harriscores” using one of the apps features called SnapMap. The user then started a thread about it in the Houston’s sub Reddit section.
The snaps show an unidentified man and woman firing wrecklessly in a neighborhood at 3:00 in the morning. After the shooting it was shortly revealed that the houses where the neighborhood resided in was one of the many areas flooded by Hurricane Harvey.
Not only was this dangerous but very idiotic as well seeing as how these two low lives could have easily killed someone during their idiotic stunt. Hopefully they’ll be captured soon.
Teen Accused Of Poisoning Breast Milk For Infant Niece
There are a lot of sick people in the world and young people are definitely not exempt from horrible and sick behavior. An example of this is an Indiana teen who attempted to kill her 11 week old niece by poisoning her breast milk.
According to court documents its has been revealed that there have been texts back and forth from the teen, Sarah Rodriguez and her boyfriend telling him that she was plotting to kill the baby. According to the investigation Rodriguez was upset that her mother allowed her brother, his fiancee and their infant to stay with them for an extended period of time.
According to police, Rodriguez told her boyfriend that she was going to crush acetaminophen and sleeping pills and mix it with a bottle of breast milk in the refrigerator.
When she later discovered that the bottle was missing Rodriguez was thrilled thinking that the baby had been fed the bottle. Unbeknownst to her, her mother discovered the bottle because her and her daughter share the same cell phone and monitors her social media. The police were soon contacted and Rodriguez fled the state but was soon caught. She faces one felony account of attempted murder. The baby has been seen by a toxicologist for poisoning but luckily nothing has been found.
This is just another example of pure evil. It’s obvious that the girl clearly has some disturbing issues, Luckily she’s far away from the baby to do any harm to her.
Link to article here:
Teen Attempts To Poison Niece
Georgia Teen Murderer Arrested In Staten Island
A Georgia teen on the run for a double murder has been found and arrested. 17 year old Akilee Zakee Wilson will be extradited back to Georgia after cops found him in a housing complex on Staten Island.
Cops say Wilson was involved in a shooting between two rival groups in Canton, Georgia. When the dust settled, one man was found dead, another injured and one who was wounded but died enroute to the hospital.
Police charged three other men, one of them being the brother of one of the victims, with murder, and a fourth one with obstruction of an officer, in connection with the shooting back in July.
It’s amazing how a lot of young people are throwing their lives away over something that was probably petty more than likely.
Link to article here:
Georgia Teen Charged With Murder
Playboy Founder Hugh Hefner, Dead At 91
The founder of Playboy Magazine, Hugh Hefner has died today at the age of 91. According to Playboy Enterprises he passed away from natural causes and was surrounded by family as he went peacefully.
Hefner dreamt of running his own magazine and began working as a copy editor at Esquire in 1952. One year later he secured enough funding to launch Playboy.
In December of 1953 the first issue issue featured the famous Marilyn Monroe as its cover girl, and the magazine and the rest is history. Hugh Hefner is considered a major pioneer in the media and he will definitely be missed.
Link to article here:
Hugh Hefner Dead At 91