Chains hung up in strip-search phone scam; police seek perp; managers tricked into undressing workers

Nation's Restaurant News, March 22, 2004 by Milford Prewitt

The crime also is becoming a race issue. Two of the four victims at a Wendy's units in Massachusetts were Brazilian immigrants, who told local media they were targeted because they are foreigners. In Oregon Mexican consular officials protested the targeting of Mexican restaurant workers who were strip searched there.

McDonald's has been hit by two lawsuits stemming from the crime in recent years.

In one case three years ago in Zanesville, Ohio, a 35-year-old unit manager who had strip-searched two female employees--18 and 19 years old--on what he testified were telephoned instructions from a police detective, was acquitted recently of misdemeanor charges of unlawful restraint and sexual imposition.

More recently, a McDonald's franchisee also emerged unscathed when a nine-count civil-rights lawsuit in federal court in Utah that alleged false imprisonment, defamation and invasion of privacy was dismissed.

In that case an 18-year-old female employee allegedly was required to jog in place in the nude in front of male and female managers under telephoned orders from a man identifying himself as a regional manager for the chain.

Richard Franey, police chief of the Abington Police Department in Massachusetts, who is one of the four Wendy's task force officials, insisted that there is no conceivable scenario in which legitimate police officers would ask restaurant managers over the phone to detain suspects, let alone strip-search them.

Investigators say the Massachusetts cases were the first in which female managers strip-searched male suspects.

Those cases also will be the first in which a charge of rape will be leveled against a suspect if he ever is brought to justice.

"I just can't get into the details, but we have consulted with the district attorney, and we are pursuing this as a case of rape," said Flaherty, the West Bridgewater detective sergeant. "One of these incidents went a bit too far."

Flaherty said that he had discussed the case with colleagues in other cities around the nation and was "shocked" to learn how widespread the strip-search phone scam has become.

"Oregon, Illinois, Maine, Florida," he said, citing other states where he has been in contact with peers investigating similar cases. "Here we thought for a moment we were just dealing with a local prank, and this thing appears to be nationwide."

Bob Bertini, a spokesman for Wendy's, said the company is prepared to pay any price to help local law enforcement in southern Massachusetts find the perpetrator. He said the company feels miserable about what happened to its employees and even sadder that its managers were tricked, but Wendy's does not intend to stay duped.

"We fell victim to a vicious scam," Bertini said, "and words cannot express how bad we feel about all who were victimized by this. We've offered the deepest apologies to the employees, and we feel terrible for the store managers who are embarrassed that they were duped.

"Our managers thought they were responding to direct orders from the police, and we are taking the matter seriously enough to do whatever we can to help the police find the person or persons responsible."