The owner of celeb-magnet Bowlmor Lanes uses Facebook and MySpace to keep minorities from making reservations at the nightclub above his trendy Union Square bowling alley, a discrimination suit charges.
Tom Shannon decided to “weed out patrons who were deemed racially problematic” after a series of incidents at Carnival NYC in February, according to the Manhattan Supreme Court filing.
Shannon allegedly held a series of meetings with his top execs “to discuss possible ways to exclude certain people . . . such as African-Americans, Asians and Latinos,” the suit says.
One “solution” involved having workers take telephone and Internet inquiries, then research the prospective patrons on social-networking Web sites “to see how they looked, dressed or where they lived,” the legal papers say. Shannon also demanded that the terms and conditions for booking events be rewritten to prohibit baseball caps, sports jerseys, oversized jeans and Timberland boots.
Five former workers who claim they were fired for objecting to “racially discriminatory practices” are seeking unspecified damages.
Shannon’s lawyer, Mercedes Colwin, described the allegations as a “nuisance suit,” calling his company, Strike Holdings, “an industry leader in employee diversity.”