What else can I do here?

[RoxMonster]

I am going to keep this kind of vague on purpose and may DD later. It appears that this week, a heinous racist hate crime was committed at a local business (well a local location of a larger chain) with no repercussions for the perpetrator but consequences for the victim. I am getting my info from posts from the victims son on FB (don't personally know him).

Beyond that, the business is trying to cover up the bad reviews on their FB page mentioning this hate crime by having several of its employees post fake five star reviews, some without text and some where they are pretending to be customers. Friends and family of employees are also posting. This appears to be illegal according to FTC.

No local news has picked this up. I told a friend of ours who works for the local news (well texted but haven't heard back) and emailed a reporter at our paper. I feel this needs to be brought to light (mainly the racist awfulness but also their cover up). What else can I do?

[sonrisa]

Was the perpetrator or incident related to the business in some way or was the location of the incident just chance?

Was the business involved in the repercussions or lack there of?

[WOT?*]

Yelp, BBB and if you know the name of the business and the injured party, contact the Secretary of State for your state to find out to file a claim for a civil rights violation with the applicable government agency.

(sonrisa asks a good question...was the incident related to the business, perpetrated by an employee, or just located at the business location and only tangentially related to the incident itself.)

[RoxMonster]

Sept 25, 2016 13:17:04 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

Was the perpetrator or incident related to the business in some way or was the location of the incident just chance?

Was the business involved in the repercussions or lack there of?

They both work(Ed) for this place and the hate crime happened at work. They were in charge of the lack of repercussions directly.

[WOT?*]

Sept 25, 2016 13:20:12 GMT -5 RoxMonster said:

Sept 25, 2016 13:17:04 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

Was the perpetrator or incident related to the business in some way or was the location of the incident just chance?

Was the business involved in the repercussions or lack there of?

They both work(Ed) for this place and the hate crime happened at work. They were in charge of the lack of repercussions directly.

If they both worked there, a labor and employment attorney (darn, if only you were in Cleveland) and a filing with the EEOC, I think. But if you get a bulldog of a L&E attorney, that might not be a bad thing. Contingency makes for some good bites outta crime.

[RoxMonster]

I talked with a friend who is a Lawyer in another town (not in this field but he knows some who are). He was outraged as well but said that it would be hard for me to file a claim with someplace like the EEOC or ACLU since I was not involved and that it should come from the victim (who I do not know at all). He said the best thing I could do was try to get press coverage of this. Thoughts on his advice?

I have not heard back from the news places I contacted so far but maybe I'll have better luck on a weekday?

[nicbreeful]

Sept 25, 2016 13:17:50 GMT -5 WOT?* said:

Yelp, BBB and if you know the name of the business and the injured party, contact the Secretary of State for your state to find out to file a claim for a civil rights violation with the applicable government agency.

(sonrisa asks a good question...was the incident related to the business, perpetrated by an employee, or just located at the business location and only tangentially related to the incident itself.)

I wouldn't bother with the BBB. You can pay to get yourself a higher grade and to get bad ratings removed. If they're going to these lengths over Yelp, they'll probably do the same with the BBB.

I liked the Secretary of State idea though!

[WOT?*]

Sept 25, 2016 17:10:33 GMT -5 nicbreeful said:

Sept 25, 2016 13:17:50 GMT -5 WOT?* said:

Yelp, BBB and if you know the name of the business and the injured party, contact the Secretary of State for your state to find out to file a claim for a civil rights violation with the applicable government agency.

(sonrisa asks a good question...was the incident related to the business, perpetrated by an employee, or just located at the business location and only tangentially related to the incident itself.)

I wouldn't bother with the BBB. You can pay to get yourself a higher grade and to get bad ratings removed. If they're going to these lengths over Yelp, they'll probably do the same with the BBB.

I liked the Secretary of State idea though!

I think more people are using applications like Yelp now so I consider BBB a very secondary (or even tertiary) resource. It's there. I think the online review resources are more handy. But the most handy would be to kick them where it counts - in the wallet, publicity and reputation. 

A L&E attorney (and the EEOC and and ACLU and SoS/DoJ) would be interested to know the story, and would be VERY interested (particularly the attorney) if this person wasn't the only one that had been affected, if it was a pattern (more clients and possibly a small class-action for the attorney, more publicity for the ACLU, government agency and more prestige for their attorney to have "uncovered" such bias, that sort of thing.)

If you let me know what state, I can see if I can find an attorney. I agree with your friend that the attorney contact needs to be with the victim rather than a third-party. The best resource for a L&E attorney/plaintiff side would be NELA.org (and referrals from other attorneys familiar with the field. My plaintiff-side friends are all part of NELA as well as the employment law sections of the local bar association, also a reasonably good resource.) If you can find a NELA attorney in your town, you might be able to put a call in if you have the contact information (or can forward them a copy of the article and case information so they may be able to contact the plaintiff. Honestly, the best bet would be for them to contact an attorney but I don't know if they would know to reference NELA or the ACLU or the EEOC.)

[highbythebeach]

Since it's a chain, has anyone notified the corporate office? 

[RoxMonster]

Sept 25, 2016 17:54:21 GMT -5 highbythebeach said:

Since it's a chain, has anyone notified the corporate office? 

Some of the fake reviews are from employees at the corporate office (if you click on their name, they list it as their job on FB, and for others, they are listed on the company's "our staff" page on their website). When I went to the corporate FB page, I scrolled back and noticed that every time they had a spate of negative reviews for whatever reason, several 5 star reviews got posted right after, all from corporate employees  :?  I could try notifying them in case someone there did care, but this doesn't make me feel very positive about it, unfortunately.

[RoxMonster]

WOT?*, I am in IL! I will try the NELA.org website. Thank you!

[Mashara]

Sept 25, 2016 18:44:08 GMT -5 RoxMonster said:

Sept 25, 2016 17:54:21 GMT -5 highbythebeach said:

Since it's a chain, has anyone notified the corporate office? 

Some of the fake reviews are from employees at the corporate office (if you click on their name, they list it as their job on FB, and for others, they are listed on the company's "our staff" page on their website). When I went to the corporate FB page, I scrolled back and noticed that every time they had a spate of negative reviews for whatever reason, several 5 star reviews got posted right after, all from corporate employees  :?  I could try notifying them in case someone there did care, but this doesn't make me feel very positive about it, unfortunately.

I don't know why this extra piece of information is making me so much more angry. As if the hate crime weren't enough. 

[zitiqueen]

Sept 25, 2016 17:10:33 GMT -5 nicbreeful said:

Sept 25, 2016 13:17:50 GMT -5 WOT?* said:

Yelp, BBB and if you know the name of the business and the injured party, contact the Secretary of State for your state to find out to file a claim for a civil rights violation with the applicable government agency.

(sonrisa asks a good question...was the incident related to the business, perpetrated by an employee, or just located at the business location and only tangentially related to the incident itself.)

I wouldn't bother with the BBB. You can pay to get yourself a higher grade and to get bad ratings removed. If they're going to these lengths over Yelp, they'll probably do the same with the BBB.

I liked the Secretary of State idea though!

THANK YOU! It always boggles my mind when anyone suggests filing with the BBB for anything!