Voyeurism class action tied to former assistant manager’s criminal case involving employees at store
A Vancouver Island grocery store will pay $750,000 to settle a voyeurism class-action lawsuit after women were secretly filmed in a staff washroom and some of the footage was uploaded to a Russian porn site.
The case centres on Red Barn at Mattick’s Ltd., a Saanich, B.C., location of the Red Barn Market chain, and its former assistant manager, Matthew Schwabe.
The settlement and key details of the case were outlined in a Dec. 8 ruling from the B.C. Supreme Court in Victoria outlining the payment and related orders against Schwabe and the store.
Criminal case uncovered hidden camera
The class action was launched by former employees Jennifer Burke and Mallory Colter on behalf of women who were recorded in the washroom and, in some cases, had their images shared online. Their lawsuit named both Red Barn Market and Schwabe, who had already faced criminal proceedings over the hidden recordings.
Police began investigating allegations of voyeurism at the Saanich market’s washroom in 2016, eventually laying charges against Schwabe in 2019, according to the CBC. Schwabe later pleaded guilty to unlawfully observing and recording eight young women and unlawfully publishing intimate images of nine women.
Schwabe admitted to secretly filming women in the washroom while working as an assistant manager, then uploading some of the intimate images to a Russian porn site. The criminal case concluded with a sentence of 15 months in custody followed by two years of probation for Schwabe.
Schwabe’s guilty pleas and conviction provided the factual foundation for the subsequent civil settlement.
Court orders payment and return of recordings
Under the Dec. 8 ruling, Red Barn at Mattick’s Ltd. must pay $750,000 within 14 days as part of the settlement with the plaintiffs, says the CBC. The total includes compensation for several women whose images were distributed online, as well as others who were filmed but did not have their images published, along with amounts for the representative plaintiffs.
The court also ordered Schwabe to hand over all recordings of the plaintiffs to them, and declared that worldwide copyright over the material is assigned away from him. According to CBC’s account, that step is meant to give the women legal control over images that were taken of them without consent.
The judgment sets out a tiered approach to damages. Five women whose intimate images were uploaded to the porn site are each to receive $85,000, reflecting the added harm of online distribution. Another woman, whose images were recorded but not shared publicly, is to be paid $25,000.
The decision further awards $15,000 each to Burke and Colter in recognition of their roles as representative plaintiffs leading the class action, says the CBC.
Burke and Colter have also committed to donating part of their compensation to charity in recognition of victims who were affected but are not part of the class, including women whose identities remain unknown.
