Alex Trelinski
A transgender customer has been given a six month prison sentence after hitting a shop assistant who would not let her put on a bra in a fitting room.
The shop worker will also get paid €1,500 in compensation, after being acquitted herself of a hate crime.
The incident happened at a lingerie store in Valladolid in north-west Spain in March 2019.
The transgender female asked the assistant for changing room access to try out a couple of bras.
The request was refused as the worker said that she ‘looked like a man’.
The customer stated that she was a woman, and left the shop, vowing to make a formal complaint..
The unhappy client returned later having gone online to check out the policy of the retailer over gender issues.
The shop worker was confronted and the customer got hold of a knicker display stand and threw it to the ground.
A struggle broke out where the assistant was punched in the face.
A person from another store came in to stop the fracas with shopping centre security staff restraining the angry customer.
A Valladolid judge found the defendant guilty of assault, but the shop worker was cleared of committing a hate crime.
It was claimed that she uttered the words, ‘Valladolid is not the city for you’ to the customer, but there was no evidence to back that up.
The fight had been recorded on the shop’s CCTV system.
The judge ruled that refusing access to a changing room was not a hate crime in itself and that she did follow company policy because her assailant ‘did look like a man’.
