Racial Profiling In NYC Stores

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One claim involved 21-year-old Kayla Phillips, who said she was forcefully stopped by 4 plainclothes officers after leaving high-end retailer Barneys in midtown Manhattan.  Phillips said she admired a $2,500 orange suede Celine bag that a friend bought for his mother, so she bought it. After completing her purchase, Phillips walked out of the Madison Avenue store where the officers accosted her. According to Phillips, the 1 female and 3 male officers interrogated her on the street, asking “How did you buy this bag, where did you get the money from?” Phillips showed them her debit card and ID, which the officers closely examined. After verifying Phillips’ purchase and returning her card, the officers let her go without so much as an apology. “I was attacked,” Phillips said.

A 2nd claim involved 19-year-old Trayon Christian, who said he was racially profiled after purchasing a belt, also at Barneys. The New York City College of Technology student was interested in a Ferragamo belt he had seen rappers wear on television. Christian bought the belt, left the store and had walked only a block before 2 undercover police officers stopped him and questioned how he was able to afford such a purchase. The officers allegedly accused him of using a fraudulent credit card and Christian was detained in a holding cell for 2 hours and interrogated, as police contacted Chase Bank to verify his card was indeed valid.

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Yet another incident involved HBO television actor Robert Brown, who said he was racially profiled at Macy’s in New York’s Herald Square.  According to Brown, star of HBO’s “Treme,”  he was stopped by at least 3 plainclothes officers, “paraded” through Macy’s in handcuffs and detained for an hour in a holding cell inside the store while an employee called police.  His detention was due to a store employee suspecting the credit card he was using to purchase a watch was not legitimate — also known as “Shopping While Black!”

After the embarrassing incidents were made public, Mark Lee, CEO of Barneys New York, said “no customer should have the unacceptable experience described in recent media reports, and we offer our sincere regret and deepest apologies.”  He added “We want to reinforce that Barneys New York has zero tolerance for any form of discrimination. Our mission is to ensure that all customers receive the highest-quality service — without exception.”

Ironically, rapper Jay-Z has been preparing to launch a clothing line with Barneys, however the profiling accusations have caused members of the African-American community to call for an immediate halt to the Jay-Z/Barneys partnership.

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Rev. Al Sharpton has vowed to take on the stores head to head, punching them in their pockets until they review and make immediate changes to their discriminatory policies.

“We’ve gone from stop and frisk to shop and frisk, and we are not going to take it,” Sharpton said during a weekly rally at his National Action Network’s headquarters in Harlem. “We are not going to live in a town where our money is considered suspect and everyone else’s money is respected.”