A lawsuit has been filed against Apple by two customers of the Upper West Side store in New York City, reports Appleinsider. The incident involves two men, Brian Johnston and Nile Charles, who have accused Apple of discrimination on the grounds that they are black.
Johnston, 34, and Charles, 25, claim that they entered the Broadway Apple store on December 9th 2010 at around 3:20 p.m.. They claim that a 6-foot-2, 255lb Apple employee invaded their “personal space” and began intimidating them, stating “You know the deal. You know the deal.”
The two men were instructed that they must leave the store unless they planned to make a purchase and told them that they were not welcome there because of their race. They state that the employee told them, “and before you say I’m racially discriminating against you, let me stop you. I am discriminating against you. I don’t want ‘your kind’ hanging out in the store.”
As the the event continued, the two men made a cell phone recording. One of the employees then told them “If you want to know why, it’s because I said so. CONSIDER ME GOD. You have to go.”
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Appleinsider says that the the filing came to light this month because the case was moved to a District court after its original filing at the New York Supreme Court.
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