Please offer me some advice. Is there any legal course I can take concerning the following incident? Thanks for any help. I was shopping in WholeFoods Market (Michigan) last night. I shop for groceries in this store once or twice a week and have regularly for at least 4 years. I was going about my normal shoping routine and when I was about finished realized (it really became blatantly obvious to me) that an employee had been following me. He had started following me after I got through produce (beginning of store shopping). I was not initally paying close attention but when isle after isle he stayed within 3 to 10 feet of me I became suspicious. Finally after I walked in a small maze of my making in the bread/pastery/desert area and he was still 3 feet away I asked him if he had a problem. He replied "A gentelman customer and employee told me they saw you shoplifting." I then asked him WHEN! He answered "Tonight and I was also told you had been previously escorted out of our store." I told him that no such thing had ever occurred and I did not steal and have not stolen anything from their store at any time. I was irate humiliated and embarrassed. This man was the acting manager of the store last night and said these things to me when customers were around out in the open of the store. He did appologize but not sincerely because he continued to walk on my heels when I went to get cucumbers I had forgotten and then all through my checkout. I finally ask him if he wanted to search me (wearing only shirt and jeans) and opened my purse offering to let him search the contents. He put his head down and declined each offer but still continued to stand watch whispering to other employees. This is not a big store actually one of the chains smallest. I am acquainted with many employees and we talk regulary when I am shopping...some have even become friends. When I returned home I was hysterical and humilliated. My husband asked the name of the acting manager (he would only give me his first name and gave me the full name of the actual manager). My husband called the acting manager was given a completly different rendition stating that customers (plural now) and employees had said I shoplifted. The acting manager was very rude to my husband and was now stating that another employee remembered me from 2 years ago and I had been escorted from the store. This all supposedly occurred while I was shopping last night. And this is the store I shop in at least once a week minimum. The only employee there last night I hadn't seen regularly was this acting manager. I am sorry to be so long winded but must add another factor. Just after I entered the store last night A man who I know and turned down the advancments of in the past was speaking to an employee near me. I avoid this man at all costs. He is unstable and has harassed me in the past in different ways. Example: He came into Blockbuster Video when I was shopping for videos and told them I was a passer of counterfeit money. I am glad they did not take him serious and told me about the occurance. Neverless I am very concerned this was the man accusing me of shoplifting last night Friday 5/12/06. My husband and I went and talked to the actual manager of WholeFoods today 5/13/06. He was very nice but guess what the accusation story has now changed again. He stated that an employee saw me last night and remembered me from 5 or 6 years ago relating to an incident where I had been banned from the store. BANNED??? We have to wait until Monday 5/15/06 when the current manager will contact the manager from 5-6 years ago to find out what this is about. No evidence could be adduced to support any accusations and the manager would not reveal who the accusing customer was or if there was an actual accusing customer. This is absolute craziness. I have never been escorted out of or banned from any WholdFoods. I have not ever been accused of shoplifting or am I guilty of the act. I feel like the world is ganging up on me. This is out of the blue. I feel I am being harassed and my character has been ruined within this store and possibly the community. I truly have never done anything wrong and cannot comprehend why this is happening. Is there any legal course I can take? This is literally making me sick. Thanks for your time and any advice Shihtzusweet

I was arrested recently at whole foods in Houston for eating free samples which a clerk even said I could try. This co needs to be sued big time. I had to sit in jail for 3 days for eating two olives, the case got dismissed, but I still have a record of shoplifting-dismissed on me and will have to pay eeven more money for expungement and they toed my car.
This hateful store mgr would not back off of calling the police even though I had just bought 53.00 of groceries and of course nothing was on me. Nor would she allow the clerk to come up front to clear me with the cop. The clerk even said, we are unique here at whole foods and encourage people to sample anything they want so that they buy more. Don' t believe it for a second, eat samples at this store, they send you to jail.
If it cost me 10,000, I will get even with these SOB' s.

I was shopping in the Bowery NYC Whole Foods last July on a day when my friend was about to be taken off life support; I was very hungry and a little spaced-out. I picked up a cartload of groceries plus some food from the prepared food section, the latter of which I set down and forgot. I went through checkout, paid for my items, and at the door was a security guard holding my container of prepared foods. He said, "Forgot something?" And I replied, "Yes, thanks! I'm so hungry I haven't eaten all day." He said, "It's no big deal it, happens all the time, but you have to speak to head of security."

So I went upstairs with him at which point I was cornered and accused of stealing. I told them I DIDN'T steal, all I did was forget something, which I still wanted, and that that's not a crime. He commanded me to open my bag and I said no. He told me if I didn't show the contents of my bag he would have me strip searched and call the cops. At this point I was terrified and humiliated as a crowd of employees was allowed to be standing at the door watching this whole exchange. Sobbing, I opened my bag and of course they found nothing but my purchases and my receipts. He told me if I didn't let them take my picture and sign something stating that I was banned from Whole Foods that they would call the cops.

At no point would he listen to my explanations of why I had forgotten my food, even though it's moot since under no terms did I steal anything. Do I have a case for harassment? I was forced with threats to agree to things that I didn't do.

Have you browsed through the information in LawInfo's Free Legal Resource Center to learn more about your issue yet? See: http://www.lawinfo.com/consumer.html and http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/index.html. You can certainly try to speak to a lawyer to determine what legal options may be available. In the meantime, you may be able to learn more on your own. Search the "Free Legal Resources" tab, or browse the Consumer Resources. Good luck.

yes, i too was wrongfully arrested by whole foods while still shopping in their outdoor produce and plant section, in cupertino, california. they hire a private security firm whose only job is to cite and arrest people. was told that because my cart had items from their whole body section (along with the basic bread, milk, lunchbox snacks, etc) and that because the security officer thought i was heading for the curb, they felt i was shoplifting, when in reality i was making a shopping decision about a flat of plant starters... where was my car in relation to the plants, did i have time on my lunch break to deal with purchasing them and putting them away at home before heading back to my daily grind?

spoke with the store's general manager, who only spouted words of simplistic black and white morality. the security company would only say that they were right and that i was being criminally prosecuted. me... never had a speeding ticket, no criminal history, single mom raising a son who is now attending graduate school at an ivy league college. i have shopped at this location for ten years! this is how they treat their long term, loyal customers???

unbelievable...

"friends don't let friends shop at whole foods"....

time to gather a collection of similar complaints against whole foods and let the world know what they are really doing. they advertise themselves as the heart of the community... bah!! make no mistake, they are a multinational corporation abusing their position of power....

This happens to many people . Whole foods is out of control . They threaten people to sign papers or they will call the police . Whole foods uses bully tactics with yelling screaming and intimidation. Whole foods also takes no responsibility if the picture they take of the person winds up on the net. THe person(suspect ) is judged guilty

Similiar situation happened to me . I spend over $500 a week at WF . No more . I am banned from the store . An item was left in the cart by error . The baggers did not notice the item either . When I took the bags out of the cart I saw the item . I thought it fell out of a bag . I put the item in the bag . Suddenly I was escorted back in the store forced to sign papers or threatened with police action . The item was for $ 3.99, my grocery bill was $136. THe guard was abusive, threatening and the manager just rambled off policy . I asked what happens to the photo? they said it was for internal use and that Whole Foods takes No responsibity if the photo gets uploadedd on the net

Yup Yup now my story. I don't care what people say who think this is black and white. If there is an "intent" to steal then I say it’s fair to pull someone aside and book them. And I do not agree with the "you can --never-- tell if they were stealing or not". BS.

Aren't professional Police trained to assess situations before making an arrest or deciding whether to give a speeder a ticket for example even though they went over the speed limit? This was a security outfit outsourced but you would expect the same kind of behavior and expectations even outsourced for security.

THE STORY:

This is what went down tonight in the Schaumburg, IL location. I had taken my 1 yr old into the store. Shopped there for probably a good hour because I had a lot of things to get as we were out of food at home.

Enjoying myself, putting ---tons--- of products in my cart (My checkout receipt at Whole Foods tonight was over $200 tonight which to me that's pretty damn good for business isn't it!), having fun with my son...clearly without any doubt to any security member watching me the entire time, that I was simply a dad shopping and there is not this "oh you can't tell if I'm a criminal or not" BS.

So I was starving. I had in mind to get pizza at whole foods as soon as I got there. I went there and got my piece of over greased pizza and proceeded to eat while I shopped. Not thinking, while I was at the olive bar about to get some olives, I looked for a trash can to throw away the empty single pizza box and threw it away.

Thing is see Whole Foods is completely arrogant in that they let people get food at their hot food stations and do not require them to pay right then and there which would make common sense --if-- you're a business who knows humans will be humans and --if-- your stores have a problem with a good amount of HONEST people forgetting to pay.

If they are having problems with people forgetting to pay and this is getting to the point of costing the company a lot, well they should enforce a better policy. Talk about policy, why the hell are they not requiring payment of food at the preparation stations if they think humans which make mistakes might forget to keep the empty boxes or containers and therefore forget to pay and it's a huge problem?

I'm sorry but this is not something you can just always slow down and realize as a customer (human being) these days. When you are shopping you're thinking about getting the food, taking care of your kid that's with you, and time...sorry but not all of us have the time that some gentleman ranted and raved about above 100% of the time where we need to slow down and think. We try, we try hard to do that but you know what WE'RE FING HUMAN! Now if I did this time and time again, sure, I feel it's fair to give me a talking to and figure out my intent at that point.

So continuing with my story, so I check out completely forgetting that I had thrown away and even eaten a piece of pizza because it was quite a while since I had finished it and had walked around the store for 45 minutes thereafter. So the whole time this fer outsourced security guy was obviously following me the entire time I was in that store. He must not have much to do tonight singling out a father shopping with his kid.

I checked out, paid my $200+, and then had a WF employee proceed to help me out with the groceries (we put the bags in another cart) and as soon as I walk out this security dude walks up and flashes a badge (probably some stupid fake badge) at me as if he's a cop saying do you know why I am stopping you? I said of course no, completely forgetting about the pizza. I said yea crap I’m so sorry, I completely forgot about the box and that's the honest truth. I apologized sincerely and agreed to walk back in and to pay or do whatever he wanted me to do.

What does he do? has me go to the very back of the store in his security office. Takes down my drivers license, my credit card info???wtf and did tell me it's alright, that this is basically a warning and that I'm being "put in the system" the stupid WF database or maybe this "system" is possibly complete BS.. saying that now I'll be tracked in the database so if next time this happens again, he has no choice but to turn me into the cops. I cooperated fully but truly was like wtf is this thinking as he was doing all these steps...my kid lying in the cart the whole time in his office.

For God sakes, I just paid $200 REGARDLESS if I should have been more responsible in keeping that box in my cart and paying for the pizza. I'm sorry yes I agree I shouldn't be so scatterbrained but everyone is human.

So it gets better. After all this BS taking me back to the office and treating me like some criminal, he walks me back up to customer service and tells me I must go back there (I had to anyway because my groceries were still sitting up there by the desk). He brings me up there to finally allow me to fing pay for the piece of pizza THANK YOU FINALLY. But, now he says he has to take a picture of me. WTF. I do not think this is legal. But I let him. What was I going to do, piss him off and have him threaten to call the cops? So he takes a picture of the pizza box that he had dug up from the trash and then proceeded to tell me to walk over next to the desk in front of all customers to take a mug shot of me with his cell phone. Again WTF? Are you joking? This is a joke.

See the thing is, if there was clear intent..I looked suspicious or I hadn't bought much and walked out with nothing and just ate the pizza then I could agree to take me in 100%.

However this was the complete opposite. Any dumbass can monitor someone like me tonight and probably 20 times figure out that this is a normal person busy with his kid and shopping and purchasing a LOT for this damn store.

They don't care. It's true and that's literally what this boils down to. And don't give me this line of BS about if they cared they'd get lawsuits on discrimination. Do you know how hard that is to fight in quart? Discrimination is very hard to prove so it's very farfetched that they'd have a problem with lawsuits on that fact.

Whole Foods treats you like s*** because it's an "I don't care what they did to you, we're staying out of it" type of attitude from WF. Again, they're doing this to people who are yes costing them money by forgetting s*** probably 1-2 times in their entire life, but at the same time I spent $200 and I'm human. Clearly you made a provide and clearly I was just shopping with my kid so just give me a chance to fing pay and leave me alone....call it amends and move on. Simple. It was clear that the intent was not there to steal when I just bought a fing whopping $200 of food. Idiots.

So, I won't be shopping there again...they don't even have to research and kick me out this time. Any good business would be fair (have some care into this process and hiring of security and how this all works) and care to some point how it's being conducted. Just as Whole Foods outsources this security s***, you'd expect them to expect the service to work with them and establish fair rules for determining scenarios in which yes, we should send this guy to jail or not. But this is not the case; they don't give a damn about their customers. If this was in the 30s do you think businesses would put some mom or dad in jail because they were shopping with their kid and forgot to pay for something and even came back in to say hey, I had this in my cart and forgot that it was in the bottom of the cart (even your cashiers didn't see it which obviously is a training issue) and be a citizen and be honest and go back and pay? Sure, they'd appreciate that. And I've done that a few times...I'm sure I'm not the only one. I don't just take s**** home if that happens.

But the first time I forget that I had thrown away a box which I should have placed back in my cart to pay for while shopping and always have ever time I've done anything like this...that one time I forget I get this BS when clearly I was not out with any intent that was there and it was obvious that this was the case that I was not intending to steal.

Thing is if you're a reasonable and smart business and you want to protect against problems where honest customers just simply make mistakes (we are human, we make mistakes unintentionally...don't tell me that's an excuse, it's human) you'd strive as a company to implementing innovative solutions or improve your process (MAKE PEOPLE PAY RIGHT THEN AND THERE) for prepared hot foods in your basically so-called food quart, rather than go for the "put them in jail easy for us solution". You cannot treat your customers black and white even in these critical situations that affect both sides of the court. Let’s have a replay and talk about it. Give the customer a chance to pay by saying "hey sir, you didn't pay for your pizza" and then "can you go up and pay" letting the customer make up for their stupid mistake first then you are just as criminal as the customers who accidentally forget to pay something that they did not notice or whose container was thrown out from a food quart situation.

Shop at Trader Joes, “The Fresh Market” http://www.thefreshmarket.com/, Antonio’s Market http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...LURAr7OMwcedZQ, …somewhere else. Whole Foods is not the only organic player in town by far.

Fresh Market has a lot better produce, products, layout, and nicer experience in my opinion. Try them out.

Adios and good luck with your customer base because you're going to increasingly need that luck if you keep this kind of handling these situations up so black & White / brutally.