Woman gets €12,000 after she was held in shop accused of stealing

The "high-handed" treatment of a shopper by a security guard cost his employers €12,000 in damages yesterday for defamation of…

The "high-handed" treatment of a shopper by a security guard cost his employers €12,000 in damages yesterday for defamation of character.

Mr Justice Esmond Smyth said in the Circuit Civil Court that the untraced security man "even had the gall" to try to persuade Sukhwinder Kaur to sign a note admitting she had stolen light bulbs.

Conor Bowman, counsel for Ms Kaur, of Colthurst Rise, Lucan, Co Dublin, had told the court how she had been imprisoned in a room at Atlantic Homecare for 2½ hours.

He said she had attended the Liffey Valley, Lucan, store of Atlantic Homecare on February 10th, 2005, and had been stopped by an employee of Federal Security Services Ltd and taken to a security room where she had been accused of shoplifting.

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"She was forced to remain in the security room for more than two hours and was continually falsely accused of having shoplifted," Mr Bowman said.

He said Federal Security Services and Atlantic Homecare had conceded liability, and he was asking the court to assess the level of damages due to Ms Kaur.

Judge Smyth said Ms Kaur, attending the shop to exchange goods she had bought earlier, had been accosted by a security man and wrongly accused of having taken light bulbs.

She had been held in a room for 2½ hours and she had not been allowed to make a telephone call to organise someone to collect her children from school.

"He then had the gall to hand her a blank piece of paper, asking her to sign it admitting she had taken the light bulbs and he would allow her to go home," Judge Smyth said.

He said that as a blameless person she quite rightly refused, and had said she would await the arrival of gardaí. She had told the security man she had a receipt for the goods and that this could be produced by her nephew.

Judge Smyth said the investigating garda had told her she could bring the receipt to the Garda station later, which she had done and her explanation had been accepted by the garda.

"This lady has impressed me as a witness and I accept she is entirely innocent of any wrongdoing," Judge Smyth said. "The manner in which she was treated was negligent and shows scant regard for her rights."

Judge Smyth said he would have "misgivings" if it was the case that the anonymous security man was still employed by the defendants.