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Lawsuit Claims Paula Deen Used N-Word, Said She Wanted Black People to ‘Tap Dance Around Like in Shirley Temple Days’

Mar. 6, 2012 10:00pm Mytheos Holt

SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Attorneys for Paula Deen said Tuesday that a former worker who claimed she was sexually harassed and subjected to a hostile work environment at a restaurant co-owned by Deen and her brother made false claims after the celebrity chef refused to pay her to keep quiet.

A lawsuit filed Monday by Lisa Jackson “makes false allegations against Paula Deen and they will be proven false in court,” said a statement from the Oliver Maner law firm, representing Deen. The law firm said the suit was filed in a local court after the Southern cooking star refused to pay the woman to “address false claims.”

Attorneys for Jackson, a former general manager at the restaurant, didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

Jackson said in the lawsuit that her doctor encouraged her to quit her post at Uncle Bubba’s Seafood and Oyster House in Savannah because she suffered from panic attacks and other stress. The restaurant is owned by Deen and her brother Bubba Hiers.

Jackson, who is white, was hired at the restaurant in February 2005 and within months was promoted to general manager.

Jackson said in the lawsuit that Hiers routinely made inappropriate sexual and racial remarks and that she heard both Hiers and Deen use racial slurs. The woman also said in the suit that she saw Hiers violently shake a black employee and that he fostered a workplace environment of intimidation.

Deen’s law firm said they had investigated Jackson’s claims and had unsuccessfully attempted to address them with her.

“She has made baseless, inflammatory allegations, threatening to go to the press and ruin Paula Deen’s reputation and the reputation of her businesses unless we paid her a large sum of money,” the firm’s statement said. “We refused to bow to that kind of pressure and refused to pay money to address false claims.”

Jackson’s lawsuit, filed in Chatham County Superior Court, seeks unspecified damages.

Hiers soon began targeting her with unwanted advances, the suit said, adding that he watched pornography in the small office the two shared. He also distributed pictures of two women having sex at an office meeting and complained about heavier staff members, the complaint said.

She said in the suit that Hiers also required black staff members as his restaurant to use the back entrance and banned them from using a customer restroom that white staffers were allowed to use.

Jackson said she routinely suffered from panic attacks that often began when Hiers came to work each morning. The situation came to a head in August 2010 when Jackson said Hiers grabbed her face during a dinner for vendors at the restaurant and declared “I love you,” then later screamed at her and spit in her face, according to the suit.

Jackson said she left her job days later after her doctor suggested quitting would improve her health.

Gawker also noticed the following excerpt from the complaint – a comment that Deen herself is alleged to have made:

Well what I would really like is a bunch of little n***ers to wear long-sleeve white shirts, black shorts and black bow ties, you know in the Shirley Temple days, they used to tap dance around. Now, that would be a true Southern wedding wouldn’t it? But we can’t do that because the media would be on me about that.

The wedding being referenced was the wedding of Deen’s brother Bubba.

(h/t Gawker)

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Comments (78)

jackbauer
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 7:35am
A white version of Jesse. Just another “Jackson” shakedown artist.

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- scruffycat
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 10:10am
  Here is some must see TV that I know everyone will love:
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bu7Ep6lCnPk
  
  Report this comment
- Ruler4You
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 10:25am
  Whether or not she said this is not my point, I didn’t hear it or see it. That being said, allow me a brief rant.
  
  We will never live in a world where individual racism is defeated. That “IS” not possible. Period. We have, pretty much, defeated systematic, systemic, institutional racism. Thank God.
  
  But you hear racist comments from the ‘minority’ communities and their minions on a regular basis with little protest from these same people. I don’t abide double standards. At all. Though we have a multitude of them in our world.
  
  So, IMHBLO, we either buck up and decide to grow some skin and allow people their stupid ignorant mistakes without a public hanging, in the spirit of live, learn, forgive and carry on, or we flay every S O B that misses a beat. But this kind of “only whitey” can be racist rat trap garbage has got to end.
  
  At what point can we say that “we have grown up.”? If we can’t get over our ridiculous baggage? we react just like the Afghanis after a Koran burning.
  
  WE are Americans. WE are better than this.
  
  Report this comment
- smithclar3nc3
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 10:48am
  That’s what she gets for talking about Michelle Obama eating during commerical breaks. The left used this very same tactic on Palin to drive her out of office.
  
  Report this comment
- JRserious
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 3:16pm
  it was so horrible she could only stand to work there for 5 years.
  
  Report this comment
The Woot
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 7:30am
Who cares, you ever have her chicken?

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- Shamrock241
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 8:52am
  @ The Woot Who cares, you ever have her chicken? Who care’s you ever hear of a Razor and a Bar of SOAP you filthy Hippie!!!!!!
  
  Report this comment
- silverhalo
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 11:31am
  @shamrock
  do you not know what an avatar is?
  
  Report this comment
smithclar3nc3
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 7:28am
That’s what she gets for talking about Michelle Obama eating during commerical breaks. This just another cordinated attack by the thin skinned left.

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- Southpaw
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 9:59am
  That’s exactly what I was thinking. How NO ONE else remembers that she made Michelle mad and now all of the sudden these huge racial allegations are coming out of the woodwork is beyond me. Wake up people!
  
  Report this comment
dissentnow
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 7:22am
People these days are so soft. I’ve had bosses that have said far worse stuff than that and i never had panic attacks. With people like this, we are doomed!

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- jnobfan
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 8:31am
  He was obviously having a hard time waking him up
  
  Report this comment
DIVINEPROVIDENCE1776
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 7:21am
Go over to stormfront, you are not welcome here.

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DWilliams08
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 6:01am
Assuming this is true, how does this rise from just working with an ******* to lawsuit level?

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- CatB
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 11:47am
  I read that as … after trying to blackmail Ms Dean she filed a lawsuit … I think Paula should go after her on the EXTORTION!
  
  Report this comment
Macman1138
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 5:46am
Paula….ah the good old days.

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Atrocities
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 5:14am
More participation trophy mentality. Your successful and rich because you worked hard and against all the odds and now I WANT MINE…. give me what I WANT or I’ll SUE YOU!!!!

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tiredofprogressives
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 4:23am
She has every right to say what she did under the First Amendment.

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piper60
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 3:45am
Paula may be southern, but that does not mean she’d say those thngs. I also think she was right not to pay up.

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- Macman1138
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 5:48am
  I hear black folks call each other that all the time, every day.
  They say it and get by with it, why can’t she?
  
  Report this comment
DIR
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 2:57am
I think Paula is a lefty. If she is, it just bit her in the a$$. I don’t believe she’d say these kind of things. She doesn’t strike me as the type.

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spikebu
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 2:54am
Am I the only one thinking if the man didn’t allow his black employees to use the front door or the bathroom he’d have been sued sideways and run out of town on a rail about a week later?

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- kentuckypatriot
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 7:23am
  Where are witnesses? Surely there are witnesses. What? Her word against his? That’s what I thought!
  
  Report this comment
- AlansTigg
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 10:35am
  that was my thought too, such blatant behavior would have been caught and reported long before now…not like the black employees would have had to put up with such treatment because no other jobs were available to them…it’s a freaking restaurant, they’d move on to a better job or file a suit
  
  Report this comment
donaldchar
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 2:04am
We lived for years in Germany, where the term “******” is used by one and all. In America many with darker skin call each other by the term but find they can make a living by taking offense at others using it. It’s better to just drop this silly preoccupation with skin tone; wake up and take King Jr’s advice. Hey, we all came off the ark…

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Ghandi was a Republican
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:56am
Unless the plaintiff takes a polygraph to back up her claim.. Throw it out. This she-devil is likely what we will see for the next few Months as the underground radicals and czars stage the workings of their precious race riot! Just like Pelsosi’s ho last week. A Plant. This is how the Alinksy rolls…

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- Paulzy
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 1:31am
  She says Yall too much and also Mr Beck needs to get rid of popups on this site…very annoying…plus the other 30 things that loads in my browser when I come here that slows this site down
  
  Report this comment
- izzy1127
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 3:51am
  Hey paulzy, your computer just sux. Or, you can just turn off the pop-ups. But Paula Deen is a “Jimmy Carter” loving liberal. Does she use the N word? Maybe. Does it matter to me? Not really. Liberals and blacks can get away with it. People just need to grow the hell up and get over the past. Just leave it there.
  
  Report this comment
Paradiddle69
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:48am
If she said these things…so what? This is standard language—in reverse—for the race-baiters/hucksters, and nothing is said about that. Does anyone actually care about this type of **** anymore?

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Panix
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:48am
This is a money grab. If the claims were real, (just about everyone has a cellphone with a video), we would have seen this plastered all over YouTube. This will play well in the NE & west, as it fits the media template about the south. I guess things were so bad at the restaurant, she could only work their 5 years.

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de Clamores
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:29am
If Paula in fact said those statements…SO..?
The reverent Farak-can and irreverent Sharpie said a mouthful too.

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sensibleadult
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:20am
I don’t see what the problem is.

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ShyMan
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:16am
All because the woman likes butter.

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AmericanFightingMan1
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:05am
Hard to say what is true and what is not. But it is plain that Al Sharpton has said all this, and worse, in reverse.

Ah, the double-standard times in America are alive and well, and the media plays the tune everyone dances to. It is a deathmarch, America. Ignorant children thinking they’re all grown up trying to run a real country. Nice try.

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hvy_gunner_0331
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:04am
Having watched Paula Deen extensively both in her cooking shows and other public appearances, I have made the conclusion that Paula Deen is far too savvy to make such outrageous statements (even if she was tempted to make them) in public. Ms. Deen is a class act, and I can not imagine her ever stooping to such a level of behavior. Somebody is out to extort themselves a little bit of the Deen Empire.

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Mimi24
Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:03am
Leave Paula alone. Y’all .

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sillyfreshness
Posted on March 6, 2012 at 11:57pm
A black employee making false claims of “racism”, now that’s unusual.

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- Panix
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:37am
  Just a fact check to your comment- Re-read paragraph 5:
  
  Jackson, who is white, was hired at the restaurant in February 2005 and within months was promoted to general manager.
  
  Report this comment
decendentof56
Posted on March 6, 2012 at 11:52pm
Heirs obviously took serious the desires of Blacks to have their own identity, separate from White America. They want their own culture, their own “Black” history taught separate from American history. They want their own Caucus ( the CBC) in Congress….their own colleges.
So, in complying with Blacks wanting to be special, Heirs wanted them tio have their own entrance door and restroom. Whats the problem?

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- xoke
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 12:20am
  I fully endorse this form of fantastic sarcasm. Well played.
  
  Report this comment
- thegreatcarnac
  Posted on March 7, 2012 at 10:23am
  Very logical…I like it.
  
  Report this comment
BurntHills
Posted on March 6, 2012 at 11:41pm
we didn’t see anything wrong at all with genteel Southern Lady chef Paula Deen at all. America still has the First Amendment at least until next January.

sounds like a greedy obamademocrat is wanting some free hard-earned Deen money.

guess we will go out and buy some Deen products now, maybe a cookbook or two.

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