Worker charged with fraud files suit against store
Former Value Village employee fired with cause alleges sexual harassment
An Ottawa thrift store worker who was charged with 15 counts of fraud under $5,000 has pleaded not guilty to the charges, and has also filed a civil suit against Value Village and two managers, claiming she was sexually harassed and the work environment was “poisoned.”
Shimaa Elazzab, 34, was charged after Value Village conducted an internal investigation and contacted police. Her trial began Thursday with the Crown outlining its case.
Court viewed nine videos of Elazzab at the cash register of the Value Village store at 1824 Bank St., where she had been employed for about five years. Crown Attorney Anne Fitzgerald told the court Elazzab was manipulating the cash register, permitting “a great deal of merchandise to depart the store without being paid for.”
Witness Martin Guindon, a lossprevention officer, told the court he identified three main methods of removing merchandise. The first was not scanning all of the items before placing them in the customer’s bag. The second was scanning items, but later voiding then, so the customer was not charged. The third was by giving the customer credit for “exchanges” that were actually items from the sales floor. This gave customers a sales credit without making a purchase.
Guindon said he reviewed videos spanning about three weeks in August and September of last year. The alleged frauds ranged between about $50 to a little over $250, and Guidon said he found several repeat customers, including one unidentified customer he called “mother.”
In one incident “mother” brought six items from the sales floor to the counter. They were registered as a return, creating a credit and were placed in her bag. She had another six items that were scanned, using up the credit she had accrued. In total, she left with 12 items and paid 50 cents, he said. On another occasion, “mother” left the store with 39 items, having paid one cent, and in a third incident, she left with 33 items and paid 82 cents.
Elazzab was terminated “for cause” on Sept. 26, 2017, and was charged by police on Jan. 2.
On June 14, she filed a statement of claim against the Value Village parent company in the United States and two managers at the store, claiming sexual harassment, wrongful dismissal and religious discrimination. She is seeking $50,000 in general damages and $50,000 in punitive damages.
None of the allegations have been proven in court.
Her statement of claim alleges that the two men, who were her superiors, “subjected Ms. Elazzab to a pattern of harassing behaviour” beginning June 2015. The claim alleges that the two men said they wanted to see her in tighter clothing, took unwelcome photographs, commented on her smell, and told her she smelled “like dirty sex.”
Elazzab alleges she was also told she could not speak Arabic to Arabic-speaking customers because Value Village is “not an Arabic store.” She alleges that managers refused to accommodate her request not to work the night shift during Ramadan and threatened to fire her if she did not dress up for Halloween.
The claim also says Elazzab was consistently told never to interfere with shoplifters, or to argue with customers about the price of items, but she had difficulty following that policy.
According to the statement of claim, Elazzab was called into a manager’s office on Sept. 19 and told that he had video footage of her “helping customers steal items.” She denied it. The manager said he could tell that she was helping family and friends steal “because the people who were stealing in their video were Arab and black and because Ms. Elazzab speaks Arabic,” the claim alleges.
Elazzab’s claim states that if she gave anyone a discount or provided them with items for free, “it was in accordance with Value Village’s policy not to argue with customers about price.”
She alleges that after she was fired five other women, all wom- en of colour, were terminated for helping their “friends and family ” steal clothing. All the women deny the allegations, according to the statement.
In the statement, Elazzab said she stated after she was shown the videos on Dec. 11 that she did not know the customers. She alleges she was subject to sexually harassing text messages from one of the managers that same day, including one that said he would give her “Pumas” in exchange for oral sex.
Joseph Addelman, Elazzab’s lawyer in the fraud case, declined to comment on Thursday. However, he told the court his client would take the stand in her own defence on Friday.