A London, Ont., restaurant and bar faces a hefty fine after pleading guilty in the case. workplace violence it saw an employee injured and hospitalized by a customer.
The incident occurred at the El Furniture Warehouse at 645 Richmond St. on London's Richmond Row on November 5, 2023. The business now faces a $55,000 fine after being found guilty in provincial offenses court.
According to the Ontario Ministry of Labour, on the day of the incident the employee was acting as the owner of the establishment and at 1 a.m. the manager asked him to ask a customer to leave the bar.
While talking to the customer, they “imitated hitting the employee,” but a second later the customer’s friend hit the employee. The employee and the second customer fell to the floor, and when the employee began to get up, they were struck again by the same person.
The employee called 911 and reported the incident to the floor manager via a social media messaging app. They were then taken to hospital and treated for their injuries.
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The department's investigation found that restaurant and bar chain El Furniture Warehouse had “virtually no procedures or training in place to respond to violent situations.”
“There were no procedures in place to call for immediate assistance, there were no walkie-talkies to ensure communication between workers, and there were no security guards present at the time of the incident,” the Labor Department wrote in a court brief Monday about the fine.
In addition, department inspectors said they learned the company had not completed a workplace risk assessment despite “incidents of violence” occurring last year.
The company pleaded guilty in provincial offenses court on Nov. 10. In addition to the $55,000 fine, she also had a 25 per cent victim surcharge levied under the Provincial Offenses Act. The surcharge goes towards a provincial government fund set up to help victims of crime.
The fine was imposed after Magistrate Abdul Ali Chahbar found that the company “failed to develop, maintain and implement a workplace violence policy” under the Occupational Health and Safety Act.
Global News reached out to Richmond Street Warehouse Restaurant Ltd., which operates under the name El Furniture Warehouse, for comment and to inquire whether a workplace violence policy was implemented following the 2023 incident.
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