White Starbucks manager fired amid racism anger earns $25m

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The episode plunged one of Americas most ubiquitous brands into crisis.

In April 2018, two black men entered a Starbucks store in Philadelphia’s Rittenhouse Square neighborhood for a business meeting with a white man who had not yet arrived. While they were waiting, and before ordering, one of them asked to use the bathroom. It was refused. Finally, they were asked to leave. When they didn’t, an employee called the police.

The ensuing arrests, captured in videos viewed millions of times online, sparked accusations of racism, protests and boycott threats. The company’s chief executive publicly apologized, describing how the men had been treated as reprehensible. Starbucks took the extraordinary step of temporarily closing 8,000 stores to educate workers about racial bias.

On Monday, in a surprising twist, a federal jury in New Jersey ordered Starbucks to pay a former regional manager $25.6 million after determining the company fired her amid fallout from the Rittenhouse episode. Square because she was white.

The jury found that Starbucks violated the federal civil rights of former manager Shannon Phillips as well as a New Jersey law that prohibits racial discrimination, awarding her $600,000 in compensatory damages and 25 millions of dollars in punitive damages.

Laura Carlin Mattiacci, lawyer for Ms Phillips, said she and her client were very pleased with the unanimous verdict, adding that she had proven with clear and convincing evidence that punitive damages were justified under the law of the New Jersey.

A Starbucks spokeswoman declined to comment.

At the time of the episode, Ms. Phillips was overseeing around 100 stores in Philadelphia, South Jersey, Delaware and parts of Maryland. She had been promoted to the position in 2011 after what she called her exemplary performance in six years as district manager in Ohio.

Ms Phillips said in the lawsuit that Starbucks, as part of its damage control efforts after the arrests, sought to punish her and other white employees in and around Philadelphia even though they did not had not been involved in the events that led to the police. to be called.

Ms Phillips said she threw herself into the company’s efforts to restore credibility and sought to support hourly workers, organizing managers in staff shops and covering up employees who were afraid to lead a gauntlet of protesters.

Amid the image polishing campaign, Ms Phillips said one of her superiors, a black woman, told her to suspend a white manager who oversaw stores in Philadelphia, but not the one in Rittenhouse Square, because allegations that he had engaged in discriminatory acts. conduct allegations that Ms Phillips said she knew were false.

By contrast, Ms Phillips said, no action was taken against the manager who oversaw the Rittenhouse Square store, a black man who Ms Phillips said promoted the employee who called the police.

Ms Phillips said she was fired shortly after refusing an order to suspend the white manager. She said she had not been told before that she was doing a poor job and that the only explanation she had been given for the dismissal was that the situation was not salvageable.

Starbucks denied in court papers that Ms Phillips was fired because she was white and said she was fired because she performed poorly in response to the episode that led to the arrests.

During this time of crisis, a Starbucks attorney wrote in a court filing that the company’s Philadelphia market needed a leader who could perform, adding that Ms Phillips had failed in every aspect of that role.

Starbucks ultimately chose not to press charges against the men at the center of the episode, Donte Robinson and Rashon Nelson, both 23 at the time. Before proceeding with the ordeal, they reached a confidential financial settlement with the company and secured a commitment from the city of Philadelphia to invest $200,000 to help young entrepreneurs.

I want to make sure this situation doesn’t happen again, Mr Robinson said in an interview at the time. What I want is for young men not to be traumatized by this, but rather motivated, inspired.

Efforts to reach Mr. Robinson and Mr. Nelson on Tuesday were unsuccessful.

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