No one should ever be accused of stealing when they’ve done absolutely nothing wrong. Unfortunately, some employees decide to profile customers based on how they look, and that’s exactly what happened to a young girl visiting a Brandy Melville store in SoHo, New York.
She and her sister hadn’t even been in the store very long when things took a shocking turn. As they tried to leave, an employee quietly tipped off the security guard, claiming the young girl was stealing. The guard immediately stopped the sisters and demanded that the girl show him her pockets.
There was zero evidence she had taken anything, but she still complied, doing exactly what he asked, despite having done nothing wrong.
At this point, the sister stepped in and asked the security guard why he was stopping them. He explained that the Brandy Melville employee claimed the young girl had put something in her pocket. But her pockets were clearly empty, so that accusation was already falling apart. When the situation started looking more like profiling, the guard tried to defend himself by insisting they “do this to everybody.” That excuse didn’t hold up either, considering customers were walking in and out of the store freely while all of this was happening. If he wasn’t stopping anyone else, how could he be sure no one else was stealing while his attention was fixed on these two girls?
Things escalated when the New York employee inserted herself into the situation. From the moment she appeared, she looked smug while smirking, chewing gum, and acting like she couldn’t care less. The poor girl didn’t know what else to do to prove she hadn’t taken anything. She had already shown her pockets, and since that wasn’t “good enough,” she took off her jacket and handed it to the employee. Instead of checking it, the employee held it with the tips of her fingers, as if it were something disgusting.
Then the employee demanded she remove her sweater too. But when the girl tried to hand it over, the employee refused to take it. So she made her take it off only to not even inspect it? At that point, it seemed less like a shoplifting check and more like an attempt to humiliate her.
Naturally, this treatment didn’t sit right with the sister. She started recording and told the employee, “Say hello to TikTok.” The employee’s response? She smiled and waved, acting like everything she was doing was perfectly normal. The video ended before viewers could see the outcome, but one thing is certain: the employee absolutely should be held accountable.
People Reacting to the Disgusting New York Employee’s Behavior
Almost everyone found that the New York employee was obnoxious and treated the girl unfairly. No job would be worth humiliating someone like this. This made one person write, “The $16 an hour cannot be that good.” Others commented on the unnecessary orders she gave to the girl as someone said, “Why does she look disgusted when you’re handing her your jacket and sweater, like it’s dirty. She requested them both and didn’t even bother checking them.” Another person then added, “The condescending ‘you’re good’ like her stuff was dirty & she didn’t want to touch it.” More people shared the same opinion as one comment read, “Why was she acting disgusted when the girl handed her the jacket and hoodie?? Girl you’re the one who stopped her and wanted to check.”
The criticism toward the New York employee didn’t stop, which is understandable. One person guessed why she treated the girl like this and said, “She didn’t feel she fit the aesthetic of the store. She was discriminating.” A retail worker then claimed that the employee had no right to act like this. “As a retail worker, we’re not allowed to accuse let alone check a customer’s items even if we 100% saw they stole.. this is so weird,” they wrote. A lot of comments also wanted her to get fired as someone added, “Call corporate and report store # and the associate name.” She definitely shouldn’t get away with this.
