I work for a big-box home improvement store, and this happened on a closing shift. I wasn’t particularly involved in this incident, but it was so stupid I just had to share it.

I work in the garden centre, and we have two additional checkouts so that customers can pay for plants, dirt, etc., without going back into the main store. These checkouts close earlier than the rest of the store for staffing reasons, and at the time of this incident, they are closed for the night.

Our lovely customer walks up to me and asks how to get out of the store. This isn’t an uncommon question in my department, as due to [global health crisis] safety, our store has been set up with several one-way aisles and the checkout in the garden is down a long aisle, so I direct him back to the centre of the store.

He tries to proceed through to our garden centre checkout anyway, which is physically blocked by plants we’ve pulled in for the night, so I direct him to the main store again, and he finally goes that way. Now, a relevant detail is that this man is holding a huge patio umbrella, which I can immediately tell on sight is one we don’t sell in our store, and he’s mumbling something about the “blue store” (our competitor). It’s bizarre, but as I’m tired, I chalk it up to just him maybe being hard of hearing or maybe a bit drunk. Maybe he’s just in the wrong place to return the umbrella (not unheard of for retail), but that’s Returns’ job, not mine.

A few minutes later, our Loss Prevention guy contacts me over the earpiece to confirm that we don’t sell that umbrella.

I later learn that the man stuffed some items into the umbrella and tried to leave with them.

CONTENT WARNING: Car Accident (Involves an infant. Everyone ends up okay.)
Like many call centres, the energy company I worked for had a policy that if we found out the caller was driving, we had to terminate the call. This was largely because driving while on the phone is illegal in the UK, and we couldn’t be seen to be encouraging illegal behaviour, but it was also for customer safety.

One day, I got a call from a woman, and as we were going through security questions, I heard the tell-tale sound of an indicator (turn signal/blinker).

Me: “Madam, are you currently driving?”

Caller: “Yes.”

Me: “Then I’m very sorry, but I must terminate this call. Please call back when you are either out of your vehicle or have pulled over.”

The woman started screaming at me, but I hung up as per company policy.

A few minutes later, I heard a colleague give the same call termination spiel. Then, a few minutes later, the same customer came through to me.

Caller: *Growling* “Stop hanging up on me!”

Me: “Have you pulled over or are you out of your vehicle?”

Caller: “I don’t have time to pull over!”

Me: “I am very sorry, but I am terminating this call.”

Caller: “If you f****** hang up on me one more time—”

I terminated the call.

I then spoke to my colleague and confirmed my suspicions that the customer they had spoken to moments earlier was the same one I had already spoken to twice. We informed our manager, who sent out a quick flag email to our team informing them of the situation.

The customer continued to call, getting angrier and angrier as the team had to disconnect the call. She did not even attempt to pull over. She kept screaming that she didn’t have time. After a solid twenty minutes of this, she got through to one of my colleagues who I’ll call Mary. Just as Mary was about to disconnect the call, the customer got into an accident.

Mary heard some horrible sounds such as bangs, crashes, groans, screams, and worst of, all a baby crying. The customer had had an infant in her car. Thankfully, we later found out that nobody was seriously hurt. Even so, an accident happening — especially one that involves an infant — is an awful thing to hear. Mary ended up crying in the bathroom, and in the end, she had to be sent home for the day. Even when she found out everyone was fine, she was still traumatised by the whole ordeal and ended up going on long-term sick leave due to mental health issues.

To top it all off, the customer lodged a complaint, blaming us for her accident. In her mind, if we had just taken her call, she never would have crashed. She tried to hold us responsible for the damages caused to her car and the car she hit, but the call recordings proved that not only had we told her to call back when it was safer and she had refused, but it also proved that she had been wilfully breaking the law. Unsurprisingly, she was deemed to be at fault by the police and her insurance company.

Are you wondering what she wanted in the end? It must’ve been something urgent, right? She was calling to find out when her next bill was due — something she could have done online or via our free-phone (toll-free) twenty-four-hour automated phone service.

When I first left home to go to university, my parents co-signed a mortgage for me on an apartment-style condominium in a small Canadian city. This was twenty years ago, so it came in at a whopping $52,000. They thought that this was a much better and more economical choice than trying to find an apartment and deal with landlords. I loved the idea and moved into my new home.

The building was almost entirely populated by the sixty-five-and-over crowd. It was small and only had twenty-four units split into halves. I had a basement condo. It was a nice place, nothing fancy, but amazing for a student. I was young (nineteen) but I was quiet, kept to myself, and didn’t do the whole party thing.

I got along with most of my neighbors, and I’d help them out by moving heavy things or carrying groceries upstairs. I was acutely aware of the age gap and the general image of a university student, so I made sure to be just an all-around great guy to avoid conflict.

The one person I could never see eye to eye with was my upstairs neighbor. For a seventy-year-old woman who couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred pounds, she walked like a d***ed elephant. She’d have gospel music on her TV at max volume at 5:00 am on Sundays, and she’d make remarks about “that d*** kid” whenever something was left out of place. She even went so far as to accuse me of breaking into her car and making a police statement saying she saw me do it. Unfortunately for her, I was out of the country on an internship at the time, but still she persisted in being a pain in my a**. I tried to approach her about the TV issue, and her response was to make sure that it was no longer just Sundays. After a couple of years of attempted diplomacy, it was clear that nothing I did would make things better.

Others in the building probably knew [Upstairs Neighbor] had it out for me, but why would this adorable little old lady try to lie and get me thrown out of the building by the condo board? (She tried at least eleven times while I lived there.)

Seven years into my time living there, I was at my job with an ambulance service just north of the city. I got called to a shooting; a guy shot his neighbor in a land dispute. The neighbor survived, but there was, of course, going to be a police investigation. The investigating officers called me to get a statement and offered to just come over to do it rather than have me travel. One of them was a constable I’d worked with quite a bit, so I said sure. We set a time for about an hour after I got home from work.

I was just getting out of the shower when they buzzed to get into the building. I hit the door buzzer, let them know I’d be ready in a second, and quickly grabbed some pants and a shirt. I heard them come in and then walk upstairs. As I was trying to throw on clothes, I heard them knock… on [Upstairs Neighbor]’s door. They introduced themselves as being from the RCMP [Royal Canadian Mounted Police] Major Crimes division and said they were looking for me.

Balls.

Upstairs Neighbor: “Oh, he lives downstairs. What do you want with him?”

Constable: “Thank you. We can’t say why we want to speak with him; it’s an active investigation.”

My heart sank… but then, I had a thought.

It only took about fifteen minutes to do my statement, and they went on their way.

And then the fun began. I knew the rumour mill would be starting. [Upstairs Neighbor] would tell everyone who would listen that Major Crimes had been looking for me and that I must be some sort of criminal. I decided to see where this went.

Pretty soon, I was getting side-eye in the hallway and neighbors were steering clear of me, so I knew she’d been talking. Apparently, I’d been arrested for robbery and kidnapping and must be out on bail, according to [Upstairs Neighbor].

I found this out when one of my neighbors who was on the condo board showed up with a letter demanding an explanation and threats to have me kicked out. I asked him what this was all about.

Condo Board Neighbor: “[Upstairs Neighbor] sent us a letter about what happened, and we had to have an emergency board meeting because people don’t feel safe with you here.”

Me: “Per the by-laws of the condo board, before any action can be taken, I can request a meeting to review and provide a defense.”

[Upstairs Neighbor] was on the board, so I knew she’d be there. They set a date for a week from then, but I was given a caution that it didn’t look good for me and that I would have to do a lot of explaining.

The meeting day came. [Upstairs Neighbor] was sitting smugly looking at me, and the other board members were giving me dirty looks.

Board President: “What do you have to say in your defence?”

I stood and quietly distributed a letter on RCMP letterhead, signed by the regional superintendent.

Letter: “Mr. [My Name] is not under suspicion of any crimes, past or current, and has not been arrested, detained, or questioned as a suspect in any criminal matter. His duties as a paramedic will often require him to make statements with regard to ongoing investigations, and in this instance on [date], investigators went to obtain a statement about an ongoing investigation in which he was professionally involved. At no time did the members discuss, disclose, or in any way indicate that he had any involvement in any wrongdoings. I am deeply saddened by the necessity of this letter, and we will be reopening an investigation into a previous incident regarding false statements made against him.”

I could tell when people read and understood it. The dirty looks shifted from me to [Upstairs Neighbor].

Upstairs Neighbor: “This is a forgery! I witnessed [My Name] being led off in handcuffs! You have to believe me!”

It didn’t help her. I stood and addressed the board and outlined the years of abuse and harassment, including the false accusation of breaking into a vehicle.

Me: “On the advice of my lawyer, I will not discuss the matter further with any member of the board; [Upstairs Neighbor] being a part of the board and using her position for the purposes of harassment opens the board as a whole to litigation, and I am still weighing my options.”

The next day, I had a knock on my door.

Board President: “[Upstairs Neighbor] has been removed from the board. She has been given a warning about her conduct, and any further harassment could result in proceedings to have her removed from the building.”

She also had a visit from the police with a summons for providing a false statement and obstructing a peace officer. She had to attend court. She pled guilty to both charges, and she was given a suspended sentence and a one-year condition not to harass, threaten, or intentionally inconvenience me in any way. If she abided by her conditions, she would receive an absolute discharge (meaning it would be removed from her record, like it never happened).

I moved to another province before her year was up, but for a brief period of time, I actually got to sleep in on Sunday mornings.

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I got a ticket just after I moved. I thought I got it all sorted, but there was something still open; I forget exactly what some two decades later.

Despite everything having been updated to my new address, the communications kept getting sent to my old address. The post office never forwarded it like I had set up, the police kept going off of the original address, and the person who lived there after me either returned the mail to the sender, which got ignored, or they just straight threw it out.

I found out when I got pulled over again — because there was a warrant for my arrest due to not appearing for a court date.

My lawyer had a field day, and by the time they were done, “up to one month in county jail” got reduced down to “the original fine plus court fees”, which is basically what the very first letter six months prior would have resulted in.

CONTENT WARNING: Sexual Assault Of A Child

This is the story of how my oldest daughter got suspended for “assaulting a colleague” and its legal conclusion.

The school called to tell me about the “assault”, so I changed into a suit, dolled up a bit (to look more “respectable”), and went there. I entered the principal’s office, where my daughter was waiting.

Principal: “Ms. [My Name], the reason I called you here is that [Daughter] here assaulted a boy, elbowing him in the nose and then punching him, knocking two teeth out. This behaviour is unacceptable for a young lady. As such, she’ll be suspended for a month.”

Me: *To my daughter* “Why did you do that, honey?”

Daughter: “He came from behind me, put his hands up my shirt, grabbed my breasts, and said, ‘Nice t*ts.’ So, I did as uncle taught me.”

Me: *To the principal* “Is this true? You’re punishing my daughter for defending herself? Then what is his punishment for sexually assaulting her?”

Principal: “No punishment. He was assaulted — something very traumatic for an eleven-year-old boy. Also, what he did is normal for boys his age.”

Me: “Okay. Can I have that in writing? Everything you just said?”

Principal: “Here’s the report with the witnessing teacher’s account.”

I picked up the report, which said exactly what the principal had just told me. Then, I got up, grabbed my daughter’s hand, and turned to the principal.

Me: “Now, I am going to the nice police officer outside, and I am going to press charges against you and this school for failing to protect its student from sexual assault and discrimination. Good day.”

(They have police due to a program called “Escola Segura”, which stations cops near schools.)

We walked outside, and I did press charges, showing the report to the cop, who took a picture of it and gave me a report number so I could follow its progress.

The next day, I woke [Daughter] up at 9:30 am and told her to take a shower, so we could go to the ER to get her hand X-rayed, just to be safe.

About twenty minutes later, I heard the water running, and then I heard her screaming. I ran into the bathroom and found her staring at the mirror, tears running down her face. Why? Her chest had bruises in the shape of the little a**hole’s hands — a very traumatizing thing for any woman, let alone an eleven-year-old girl.

I helped her shower and get dressed, and then I called the police, giving them the case number and requesting their presence with a forensic tech at the hospital, also explaining why.

We got there and were escorted through a side door. The tech (a woman) along with a female nurse took pictures and measured the bruises. While this was happening, I was present and giving a statement to a CPS (Child Protective Services) lady, who was shocked at the principal’s reaction to the whole thing. The police officers informed me that they would be adding assault charges against a kid who did this, beyond the ones already filed against him and the school.

As soon as we got home, [Daughter] curled up in my bed, cried under the sheets, and fell asleep. I was feeling murderous. 

My husband and I and our lawyer had a meeting a few days later with the representatives from the Education Department and the Justice Department. They informed us that the principal had been fired and forbidden from working with children. My daughter’s suspension had been revoked, but they would be giving her the time needed for her to recover, and they offered €100,000 in compensation if we didn’t go to court. We agreed.

As for the kid who assaulted my daughter, he was expelled from the school. Legally, we can’t sue him for damages as he is a minor, but the State is proceeding with the criminal charges, and they are going to offer him a five-year suspended sentence and a restraining order so he can’t get within 200m of my daughter. Should he refuse, he’ll get five years in a correction house and between two to five years in an adult prison.

We agreed to their proposal.

They also asked if we wanted [Daughter] to be homeschooled. She’d have the full support of the State, and she would only have to take the tests and exams at the school. We later talked with her and she chose to be homeschooled for the rest of the year since we’re moving abroad next year anyway.

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