Lawsuit alleges racial profiling at Marple Marshalls

Police searched woman two times after the store manager made accusations, and came up empty.

A Philadelphia pre-school teacher has filed suit seeking unspecified damages in a claim she was racially profiled at the Marshalls in the Marple Crossroads Shopping Center almost two years ago.

Attorneys for Cordella Young of Philadelphia filed suit last week against The TJX Companies Inc., Marmaxx Operating Corp., which does business as Marshalls and Iris Sanchez of Folsom in Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.

The suit claims that on Feb. 24, 2021, Sanchez, who was Marshalls on-duty manager that day, called 911 and “falsely accused Ms. Young of theft — not because she had stolen anything, but because she is Black.”

Andrew Mastrangelo, assistant vice president of Global Communications for TJX, Marshalls’ parent company, offered a brief statement.

“While we are aware of the complaint filed in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas, it is our company’s longstanding practice not to comment on pending litigation,” he said.

Several attempts to reach Sanchez or an attorney representing her were not successful.

The lawsuit’s account

According to the suit, Young went to the Marshalls in the Marple Crossroads Shopping Center at 400 S. State Road in Marple and purchased $240 worth of items for which she had the receipt.

Court documents stated that around 7:22 p.m. that evening, Sanchez called 911 and accused Young of shoplifting and told the 911 operator that “a (B)lack female … put perfume in an orange back pack.” She then said the woman was currently at the store’s register. According to the lawsuit: Minutes later, two members of the Marple Township Police Department arrived at the Marshalls and spoke with Sanchez in the Marshalls’ vestibule. According to court documents, it was then that Sanchez pointed to Young and identified her as the “(B)lack female” who stole the perfume.

The officers then apprehended Young and informed her that she had been accused of theft.

Young was “(t)aken aback by the false accusation and the police presence” and explained she had purchased numerous items from the store and had a receipt. She also volunteered to produce all of the merchandise that she had purchased, which she did.

According to the court documents, Marple police then looked through her bags and confirmed Young had made the purchases with her debit card “and she had not stolen anything.”

They also performed a background check on Young, whom they found to have “an unblemished record without any warrants, prior arrests or convictions.”

The Marple detective then spoke with Sanchez as her accusation of theft was unable to be substantiated.

She then allegedly told the detective that Young was in possession of a “device” that allowed her to open locked store containers and remove fragrances.

Based on that accusation, Young, who was still in police custody, was subjected to a second search by police, which, also came up empty.

After this, one of the police officers spoke with Sanchez.

Sanchez told police she noticed missing fragrance in certain containers and because “the (B)lack female with a backpack was in the area, she knew it was her.”

She also allegedly told police that upon seeing “the (B) lack female,” “she was scared for her safety and the safety of the store.”

The attorneys representing Young describe her as “diminutive, soft-spoke and nonconfrontational.”

According to court documents, Sanchez told the police officer she did not actually observe Young stealing any items from the containers.

The documents stated, “Absolved of any wrongdoing after being involuntarily apprehended by three White police officers for 40 minutes, Ms. Young was profoundly distraught and fearful.”

She then returned all of the items she had purchased from Marshalls. She then allegedly had a conversation with Sanchez in the presence of police officers in which Sanchez allegedly admitted she did not observe Young steal anything.

When asked by police why she called them if she didn’t see Young steal anything, Sanchez “had no explanation for that,” according to court documents, which also stated, “But the answer was clear: Ms Young had been racially profiled.”

The police report, aftermath

In the Marple police incident report, the investigating officers confirmed that Young did not steal anything.

In addition, they maintained that “Sanchez’s false allegations placed the investigating officers at a significant risk of civil liability for unlawfully detaining Ms. Young.”

Days after the incident, Young then had a phone conversation with TJX Regional Vice President Guy Reda in which he allegedly told her Sanchez violated company policy and the matter would be handled internally.

Court documents say TJX investigated the incident and decided to terminate Sanchez’s employment.

Young also filed a charge of discrimination with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission. In response, TJX allegedly admitted Sanchez did not follow company policy but continued to claim that Sanchez did not discriminate against or racially profile Young.

According to court documents, TJX in their investigation did not interview Young or the three officers who investigated the incident and did not obtain the police incident report.

The suit claims “TJX has failed to enforce its antidiscrimination policy/code of conduct and failed to adequately train, supervise, and monitor its employees to prevent racial profiling and implicit bias.”

Under medical care

The suit also says that the trauma Young experienced from this incident has been “immediate, continuous and severe.”

She was diagnosed from her primary care physician as having “situation anxiety,” because she was suffering from anxiety, depression, appetite loss, avoidant behaviors, crying spells, fatigue, migraines, nightmares and was having flashbacks of being apprehended by the police and falsely labeled a thief.

As a result, Young has been working with a therapist for almost two years and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and adjustment disorder with mixed anxiety and depressed mood.

Court documents said Young also has poor sleep, fear in public spaces, an inability to shop alone without experiencing severe panic, isolation from family and friends, trauma from seeing police officers and flashbacks of the incident.

“As a result of these symptoms, Ms. Young is too humiliated, shocked, and ashamed to frequent stores and run errands out of fear that she will be racially profiled yet again,” the court document states.

The suit also says Young, who has been a pre-school teacher since 1992, has broken down in front of her students and supervisor, “making her feel as if she is incapable of performing her job duties as she did before the incident.”

And while the suit says Young’s teaching style is rooted in Quaker values embracing diversity, it says she is apprehensive that “her students will grow up in a society where their race dictates whether they are treated with dignity and respect.”

The court documents also state that Young “has suffered substantial, daily, and permanent emotional and physical trauma because of this incident.”

As a result, Young is seeking compensatory and punitive damages for counts of negligent training, supervision and monitoring; racial profiling; and violations of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act against TJX and Marmaxx and negligence and intentional inflection of emotional distress against all three defendants.

“Sanchez’s conduct in falsely accusing Ms. Young of theft because she is Black, which caused three White police officers to apprehend her for approximately 40 minutes and subject her to unreasonable searches where she was put in fear of her life is conduct so outrageous in character and so extreme in degree as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency, and is atrocious and utterly intolerable in a civilized community,” the documents stated.

“This conduct is even more outrageous in character and extreme in degree,” the suit continued, “because Defendant Sanchez admitted that she lied to police by stating that she didn’t actually observe Ms. Young steal anything, which placed the three police officers at significant risk of civil liability for wrongfully detaining Ms. Young.”

A jury trial is being sought.