Motel Owner Fined $40,000 - Didn't Want 'Blacks' In His Swimming Pool

[matcom]

someone take this fucker out of the GENE pool :puke:

<snip>

TALLAHASSEE - Crystal Parker just wanted to cool off in the motel swimming pool with her uncle and some kids. But she said the motel's owner had another idea: "no coloreds."

"I felt very unwanted," said Parker, 16, a sophomore at Taylor County High School.

That was two years ago at the Southern Inn, a faded two-story motel on U.S. 19 in Perry, where owner Raj Patel displayed a large American flag in the lobby window. The state said he also displayed contempt for black patrons by pouring chemicals into the pool to chase them off and by assigning them shabbier rooms.

Patel has agreed to pay the state $40,000 to resolve three separate complaints of racial discrimination, Attorney General Charlie Crist said Tuesday. It's the first case brought by the state since the Legislature broadened the state civil rights law two years ago to allow lawsuits for patterns of discrimination.

"It breaks your heart when you hear about this type of thing," Crist said. "Florida is open for business, but we're not open for discrimination."

The victims of discriminatory acts involving the inn's swimming pool in 1999 and 2003 will receive $1,000 each. The state is accepting written claims for the next 60 days from other black guests, who can receive up to $250 if they can prove they were guests during the period of the incidents.

To be eligible, they must prove they stayed at the Southern Inn between June 1, 2000, and June 30, 2004. Forms are on the attorney general's Web site, www.myfloridalegal.com Questions should be directed to Crist's office of civil rights at 954 712-4607. The state said Patel's employees, both black and white, provided critical information.

Under the settlement, Patel, 54, can never again operate a place of lodging in the United States. He has sold the Southern Inn in Taylor County and returned to his native India, attorney John Weed said Tuesday, declining to comment further.

"He's instructed me not to speak," Weed said.

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/09/07/State/40_000_deal_ends_mote.shtml

[bliss_eternal]

1. This just leaves me speechless...

I'm glad he can no longer operate a place of lodging.

:(

[xmas74]

2. Sounds like my exboss.

[redqueen]

3. What the....

FUCKING FUCK is wrong with some people?

:grr: :mad: :grr: :(

[bliss_eternal]

4. Did I miss something, or wouldn't this guy have brown skin, too?

:wtf:

[ET Awful]

5. Hey Mr. Patel . . . did you know that Mohandas Gandhi (yeah, that kind

gentleman that helped your country gain its independence) helped earn more rights for blacks and Indians in South Africa before he started working for rights in India?

That's right, that nice little guy that helped make sure you lived in a nation free from British rule worked for freedom for colored folks even before he worked for your freedom.

[IntravenousDemilo]

6. In a just world...

he would have been legally required to forfeit his business -- lock, stock, and barrel -- to the people he discriminated against, as a warning to others.

[Rabrrrrrr]

7. I bet he supports the caste system

or else came from the untouchables and hasn't dealt with the anger issues and so finds power by abusing his power over others.

[Gormy Cuss]

8. having worked on fair housing issues in the past....

I can tell you that yes indeed, sometimes the racists make it this easy to prove discrimination.
The only easier kind are landlords who flat out state they won't rent to any (fill in your own blanks) to the fair housing or civil rights investigator.

[ContraBass Black]

9. I like the punishment.

[sakabatou]

10. He hasn't crawled from out under his rock...

Has been there for the last... oh 300 yrs...

[salin]

11. Sadly this is still far too common

perhaps not the extreme of pouring chemicals into the pool - but the blatant discrimination with an absent sense of those discriminating that there is something wrong with what they are doing. Grrrr.