HSBC Banker Sues Yahoo Singapore for Impostor’s Identity

Story first reported from Bloomberg News

Sandeep Sharma, a managing director at HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA)’s private banking arm, claimed in a lawsuit he had been defamed by a Yahoo! Inc. (YHOO) user impersonating him and making offensive remarks about Singaporeans.

Sharma asked Singapore’s High Court to order Yahoo! Asia Pacific Pte to reveal details including the identity of the person using the moniker “Sandeep” and claiming to be Sharma. A closed hearing is scheduled for today.

“Sandeep” made at least three posts in July on Yahoo’s websites disparaging Singaporeans including calling them “highly incompetent” and saying foreigners are Singapore’s future, according to a lawsuit filed on Aug. 8, the eve of the Southeast Asian city’s 47th National Day.

The complaint highlights tensions that have developed in Singapore between foreigners, who make up a third of the country’s 5.2 million population, and citizens whose anger over the influx contributed to the ruling party’s worst performance since independence in last year’s general election.

Yahoo hasn’t filed its response to the complaint. Yahoo’s Southeast Asia general counsel Siew Kum Hong referred questions to Madhavi Tumkur, the company’s spokeswoman, who didn’t respond to two e-mails and a phone call to her office.

Sharma, who filed a police report last month on the same matter, didn’t reply to two e-mails or return a call requesting comment. Gareth Hewett, a HSBC spokesman, declined to comment.

Foreign Talent

“The issue of foreign talent in Singapore is a touchy one,” Sharma, 44, said in court papers. “I believe these posts will lead to and excite continued ill-feeling and disaffection among Singaporeans to foreigners like me living and working in their midst.”

Sharma moved to Singapore from India in 2007 with his wife and two children and became a permanent resident the next year, he said in court papers. He joined HSBC as the head of Global South Asian Diaspora in March 2010 from Barclays Plc’s wealth management unit, where he was head of its South Asian business.

He doesn’t have a Yahoo account and has no suspects in mind, according to court papers.

At least one person has written to the London-based bank that he will not be a client because of the posts, according to court papers. HSBC’s requests to Yahoo to provide information about the user were rebuffed, according to the complaint.

User Data

“HSBC and Mr. Sharma are victims of this callous post by a person who evidently is happy to hide behind the screen of anonymity,” according to a July 6 e-mail to Yahoo from the bank’s legal adviser Jerome Robert cited in the complaint. “Yahoo can help in putting things right.”

Yahoo said it couldn’t reveal data related to its users unless there was a court or police order, the operator of the biggest U.S. Web portal said in a July 10 e-mail to HSBC and cited in the lawsuit.

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong introduced stricter immigration policies and trimmed ministerial pay after his ruling People’s Action Party won the general election last year with the smallest-ever margin of popular votes.

The case is Sandeep Sharma v Yahoo! Asia Pacific Pte. OS750/2012. Singapore High Court.

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Harassment Lawsuit for Paula Deen’s Brother

First appeared in USA Today

The former general manager of a restaurant co-owned by Paula Deen claimed in a lawsuit filed Monday she was sexually harassed and subjected to a hostile work environment rife with sexual innuendo, physical intimidation and racial slurs. A Chicago Employment Lawyer is very familiar with these kinds of lawsuits.

Lisa Jackson said in the lawsuit that her physician encouraged her to quit working at Uncle Bubba's Seafood and Oyster House because she suffered from panic attacks and other stress from working there. The restaurant is owned by Deen and her brother Bubba Hiers.

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. She also said in the lawsuit she saw Hiers violently shake a black employee and that he fostered an environment of intimidation.

A spokesman for Deen, who won a Daytime Emmy as Outstanding Lifestyle Host in 2007, declined to comment on the pending litigation, and Hiers didn't immediately return calls seeking comment.

Jackson, who is white, was hired at the restaurant in February 2005 and within months was promoted to general manager with a mandate from Deen to turn it into a success.

Hiers soon began targeting her with unwanted advances, she said, and 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. A Salt Lake City Employment Lawyer considers this to be inexcusable.

She said Hiers made racially insensitive remarks and that his restaurant required black staff members to use the back entrance and banned them from using a customer restroom that white staffers were allowed to use.

During one meeting in July 2010, she said Hiers violently shook a black male kitchen worker. Deen later decided to invite the man to her mansion to smooth things over rather than to address her brother's conduct, the lawsuit said. In another incident, Hiers challenged his staffers to a fight, she said.

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. A Boston Employment Lawyer finds these acts intolerable.

Jackson said she left her job days later after her doctor suggested quitting her job would improve her health. She said in the lawsuit, which seeks unspecified damages, that she "continues to endure immense pain and has suffered greatly at the hands of Defendants' outrageous and intolerable conduct."