One day in the Summer of 2023, after collecting his 13-year-old son from tennis practice, my client Jameel Rahmaan attended his local Sainsburys store to purchase a carton of milk. Unfortunately this routine shopping expedition was to become a traumatic encounter with security staff, who turned a minor dispute about whether Jameel was able to borrow a basket from the store, into a brutal beating which left this innocent shopper with multiple injuries.
Once in the store, Jameel saw some items on offer, and so popped them in his basket, as well as the milk.
Jameel then went to the checkout where he paid for his shopping. Having purchased more items than he had expected, and not having a bag with him, my client left the store with the goods still in the basket. He had shopped at the store on a regular basis for many years and simply intended to borrow the basket to transport his shopping home, and return it a few days later, on his next visit to the store.
Jameel walked to his car and deposited the basket in his car boot. He then got into his car and proceeded to drive out of the car park.
Before Jameel reached the exit, however, a uniformed security guard, indicated for him to stop, which he did. The guard informed my client that he could not take the basket, even just to transport his shopping home. After a brief discussion, Jameel acquiesced, parked up in an empty parking bay, and exited his car.
However, as Jameel went to remove his shopping from the basket, the first security guard and another of his colleagues came up, and started jostling and pushing Jameel, apparently to get at the basket. They then proceeded to reach into the car boot and started pulling my client’s shopping out of the basket, damaging one of the food items in the process. It subsequently transpired that the security guards were employed by Mitie Security Ltd, a well- known security firm who sub-contract to firms nationwide. According to Mitie, it is “the UK’s biggest security provider” employing over 20,000 security personnel and its supermarket clients include Sainsburys, M&S and Co-op.
Jameel tried to push the men away, to keep them off both himself and his property, protesting that they had no right to touch him or his belongings in the first place.
Having emptied and discarded the basket, and feeling quite incensed about what had happened, my client then went into the store to complain about the behaviour of the security staff, who both followed him.
Inside the shop, Jameel asked one of the store employees to call the manager and then began to explain to those staff members around him what had happened in the car park. The conversation became heated, and the security guards approached Jameel in an aggressive manner, with verbal insults and threats of violence.
Matters then escalated further, with the two security staff grabbing Jameel and wrestling him to the ground. In the process, Jameel’s glasses were knocked off and he suffered a cut to his forehead.
Jameel had to shout for the men to get off him and allow him up, which after a short period of time, they did. A member of Sainsbury’s staff retrieved Jameel’s glasses and treated the cut on his head.
Jameel was shell- shocked by what had been done to him, and the only consolation for him was that his teenage son was still in the car and had not had to witness this scene.
The list of injuries that had been inflicted on Jameel was longer than his shopping list: a cut to the right side of his forehead; bruising and swelling of his forehead and right eye socket; bruises and scratches to the right side of his torso, around his armpit; bruising to both sides of his neck and to right shoulder; stiffness and discomfort in his right arm; a bruise and scrape on his back; a friction burn on his chest; a bruised and swollen left thumb and a severe headache. The most persistent of these injuries were those to Jameel’s thumb and back, deemed by medical expert opinion to be an exacerbation of a pre-existing back complaint and an acceleration of a previously asymptomatic degenerative condition.
Before leaving Sainsbury’s, Jameel had spoken to the store manager about what had happened; the manager assured him that she would investigate the incident – but Jameel never heard from her again.
How Jameel helped himself; and how I helped him Win
Upon returning home, Jameel sensibly video- documented his injuries which is something I would always advise people to do in such situations; there is little that can beat early, contemporaneous evidence. He followed this up with an online GP consultation, to further record and obtain advice about his injuries. In taking these steps, and also in acting quickly to request (and therefore preserve) the CCTV footage of the incident, along with the security guards’ body camera footage (which would also contain the audio recording which is absent from CCTV) , Jameel had done everything right. A solicitor could not ask for a more organised and determined client.
He was also quite right to approach the Police and make a criminal complaint against the security guards. The Metropolitan Police not only refused to get involved; they informed Jameel that they had viewed the CCTV footage but that, in their judgement, he was the aggressor. Jameel was, understandably, deeply shocked by this false accusation and also the implied threat of the Police to prosecute him if he took the matter any further. His faith and respect in the Police was deeply shaken by this outcome, and understandably so – but unfortunately, I have seen that type of behaviour from the Police too often to be surprised by it. Many times, I have been involved in cases where, no matter how ‘Wild West’ the actions of private security guards/ bouncers are, the Police either take their side or refuse to get involved; acting as if they were the security industry’s ‘Big Brothers’, which in a way, of course, they are. On the other side of the equation, all too many security guards are frustrated ‘mall cops’ with no proper training.
Jameel further contacted the Sainsbury’s customer complaints team, whose front-line staff were sympathetic (“We’re a supermarket, not a night-club!”), but the case handler ultimately washed their hands of the matter and said that it was a ‘police matter’. This added to Jameel’s frustration and sense of betrayal after two decades of being a loyal customer.
Jameel told me that he has always had a strong moral code and sense of justice; he expected much better from a huge and reputable company such Sainsburys, and of course from the Metropolitan Police, but felt both were ultimately dishonest in their dealings with him and he felt not only deeply let down, but also angry.
I helped him to channel that anger into a well-thought-out and well-fought civil claim against the principal culprits, Mitie Security.
Before Jameel consulted me, he had approached other well-known solicitors’ firms who heavily advertise their expertise in this type of case – including Minster Law and Irwin Mitchell – but all of those firms turned him down, and he was told that he didn’t have a winnable claim. When I reviewed the evidence, I begged to differ.
I helped Jameel to appropriately bolster his claim, by astute legal argument. I also commissioned expert medical evidence, from both an orthopaedic surgeon and psychologist to help Jameel prove and quantify the full extent of his injuries.
In response to the claim which I presented on Jameel’s behalf, Mitie admitted ‘failings’, but made a puny initial offer of settlement in the sum of only £750.
Ultimately, the combined efforts of myself and my client resulted in Mitie Security, who now had the threat of Court proceedings hanging over them, agreeing to pay Jameel damages in the sum of £18,500 plus his legal costs.
This is another example of the type of teamwork I pride myself on: the courageous client and the expert solicitor combining to rebalance the scales of justice, when the Police themselves turn a blind eye.
And once again we are reminded that so called security staff are often the biggest risks to the public in the places they are supposed to be protecting. That is a structural problem which arises from poor recruitment, management and training practices; but when the ‘mighty’ look the other way when these incidents and injuries occur, I am proud to use the common law to help the common man.
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