The Reject Shop Limited being sued over serial creep staffer
A popular variety chain could be forced to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for allegedly failing to take action against a staff member caught filming up women’s skirts.
Police & Courts
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A creep staffer caught filming up more than 60 women’s skirts could cost a major variety store hundreds of thousands of dollars after they allegedly failed to take serious action against him.
The Reject Shop Limited is being sued in the District Court for over $420,000 after a male staff member was caught unlawfully filming up a customer’s dress while on shift in November 2020.
The woman, through Shine Lawyers, is suing the major chain, including for funds to see a psychologist, after she says the incident left her with depression and PTSD.
Brendan Banning had been caught filming another woman over a year prior to the 2020 incident, however was still able to keep his job as a retail assistant at the chain’s Morayfield store, according to a Statement of Claim.
On November 19, 2020, a woman, who The Courier-Mail has chosen not to name, caught Banning with his phone face down on the ground and his camera pointing up underneath her dress.
“At that moment I looked down and saw a mobile phone, and the camera was facing up at me,” the woman told The Courier-Mail in an emotional interview.
“I said ‘excuse me’ … (I wanted to know) why was he there with his phone placed like that.”
The woman, then aged 23, says after Banning responded with “what?”, she made a complaint to his superiors, who noted her details – including her name and place of employment, which was also within the Morayfield Shopping Centre.
The woman also reported the incident to police – an act that would later help investigators identify a total of 62 instances where Banning repeated the same type of offending between March 2019 to December 2020 – all committed within the Morayfield Shopping Centre.
Because of the woman’s report, Banning – who is also believed to also go by another surname – was charged and subsequently pleaded guilty to 62 counts of observation or recordings in breach of privacy of genital or anal region, for unlawfully filming up women’s skirts.
He was sentenced to 50 hours of community service, and received an 18 month probation order and the criminal matter was closed.
The woman said she went to police out of frustration over the incident, and in the hopes it would help other women.
The Reject Shop had been made aware of at least one prior complaint about Banning filming a female customer in the store prior to the 2020 incident, the claim states.
The document states one of Banning’s superiors had been told of a November 2019 incident by the customer’s husband, however The Reject Shop staff did not conduct an investigation or review relative CCTV, and instead “accepted (Banning’s) explanation he was taking a photograph of stock bays in the store”.
Shine Lawyers solicitor Jake Gardiner said as a result of prior offending, his team believes The Reject Shop “was on notice that such incidents had and could occur, and that they failed to take appropriate action to ensure the safety of customers like (client) while shopping in the store”.
Upon learning Banning had previously been known to film female customers, the woman told The Courier-Mail she “felt physically unwell.”
“It makes me sick to know I’m not the only one and that he got away with it for so long,” she said.
“Anyone could walk in there, anyone’s daughter or wife or anyone could be in that shop. It irritated me, I felt disgusted. It’s not fair and it wasn’t something I enjoyed learning …
“It’s not his right to do that … It’s my body, it’s not his choice.”
Mr Gardiner said his client had been impacted financially, professionally and personally.
“She’s taken hundreds of hours of leave from work, she’s had to fund very costly continuing medical treatment, she’s had to change jobs because she was working in the same shopping centre where the incident occurred, and, she’s lost income as a direct result of all of that,” he said.
Mr Gardiner called on anyone else with similar experiences at The Reject Shop, who may have been filmed at The Reject Shop, to come forward, while a spokesman from the retailer said The Reject Shop “take(s) the allegations made in the Statement of Claim regarding the conduct of one of our employees very seriously.”
“When this matter was brought to our attention we instigated an immediate and thorough investigation into it.”
It’s believed Banning no longer works at The Reject Shop.
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