Black women booted from Napa Valley wine train file lawsuit

In the lawsuit filed against the Napa Valley Wine Train in the U.S. District Court in Northern California, 11 members of the Sistahs on the Reading Edge Book Club called the experience degrading and surreal.

The company issued an apology after the women were ejected, promising additional training for employees on cultural diversity and sensitivity and free passes for a future trip on the tourist-oriented rail attraction. The federal lawsuit lobs a slew of accusations at Napa Valley Wine Train and its employees, including claims of racial discrimination, defamation, libel, breach of contract, bad faith dealing, unfair competition and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

However, someone from the company posted an account of the incident on Facebook that accused the women of “verbal and physical abuse toward other guests and staff”.

The women and their lawyer, Waukeen McCoy, scheduled a news conference in San Francisco on Thursday to announce the legal action for $11 million in damages. The hashtag #LaughingWhileBlack took off on social media after the incident.

“We don’t ever want our mothers, grandmothers and sisters to be disrespected like that just because of the color of their skin or because they want to ride a train and read a book”, said Dan Daniels Sr., a San Rafael-based NAACP leader.

The group of 11 women boarded the Napa Valley Wine train on August 22 to celebrate a birthday and discuss a book. “I truly know now how it is to be a black woman and to be discriminated against in this society”, Carlson said. Into their trip, the women say that a manager approached them and claimed they were “laughing too loud”. The lawsuit also lays blame on wine train employee Anna Marquinn, the maître d’hotel who kicked the group off the train. “These are highly educated, successful, and well-respected women in their community, and the treatment they received was disgraceful and illegal”.

An investigation by Slate uncovered a history of racist behavior at the company. At least one passenger scolded the women, saying, “This is not a bar”, according to the lawsuit.

Kicking the plaintiffs off the train gave white privilege to the passenger who verbally complained in the bar auto.

Being “paraded” in front of the other passengers who “snickered” as they walked by was humiliating, according to the women. They were escorted through several cars as other passengers stared and then off the train and into a dirt lot where police were waiting, according to the suit.

After they were booted from the train, Johnson said the women were guilty of “laughing while black”.

“It has come to the point my friends that even black folks can’t be happy in this country”, said the Rev. Amos Brown, president of the NAACP in San Francisco.