What does it take to have someone strip searched? If it’s a fast food employee, apparently not much:
Authorities say a 39-year-old Taco Bell manager forced a 17-year-old female employee to strip and endure a body search after a caller posing as a police officer gave him instructions to do so at the Fountain Hills restaurant this week.
The girl was taken to a back room in the restaurant and told to disrobe, said Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Once naked, she was asked to do jumping jacks and was then subjected to a body search, Arpaio said.
The apparent ruse began when a caller posing as a police officer called the Taco Bell this week giving a general description of a female employee he said needed to be detained as a crime suspect.
Turns out this isn’t the only manager to get duped:
It might seem implausible that any manager could be compelled by an unknown caller to order someone to entirely disrobe and submit to a humiliating search for drugs or stolen money. Or that someone would succumb to such an examination. But investigators say there have been dozens of similar cases since 1999, involving Burger King, Wendy’s, Applebee’s and others. Similar incidents have been reported in Massachusetts, South Dakota, Indiana, Utah and Ohio. The managers and the victims of such incidents have been male and female. Investigators have begun linking the cases and say they believe the hoaxes are the work of a single person calling from North Florida public telephones using a phone card.
His likely motive, they say: Not money, but power and perversion.
These mistakes can be costly:
These cases raise enormous, complex liability issues: Last summer, an Odessa, Texas, Burger King franchise paid $35,000 to settle a civil suit filed by an employee who alleged she was forced to submit to a strip search by a male manager who received a similar phone call. The restaurant’s manager was arrested and charged with “illegal restraint,” and fined $500.
And last week, Wendy’s International Inc. said it had been hit with four lawsuits by former workers of Boston-area company-owned outlets. In February, managers there, acting on a call from a man posing as a police officer, ordered the workers to submit to a strip search for allegedly stolen money.
Employers are justified in being concerned about employee theft, but physical searches are a bad idea, especially when initiated by an anonymous phone call.
Hmmmmmmmm…. Do I understand that not only was an employee ultimately forced to submit to a strip search by a manager based on an anonymous phone call, but that the employee was of one sex and the manager of the opposing sex?
Hoo, boy. Can you say “punitive damages”? I knew you could….
Almost makes me wish I was still in practice
Nice investigative touch–making the 17-year-old do jumping jacks. The AP/Wall Street Journal story (second link) says a customer (not employee) was searched. If true, it’s even worse.
Apparently some people are so intimidated by the police they’ll do what they say even from an anonymous phone call…
I wonder if the male manger actually enjoyed having such a “duty” to perform. I mean after all, would he react the same way if he were told to have someone shove a taco up his a$$?
What if he was told to penetrate her? I think if the caller was convicing enough, this manager would have done it. Part of the reason is that because all he needs is a good enough excuse to do something he wouldn’t mind doing otherwise.
I think a good way immunize the industry is to have more managers sued off their asses. This will be a very good way to teach other managers not to follow their example.
PS I know my post is a little after the fact, but just feel like venting after reading this story.