Nitra Gipson sold her car to pay for her last two semesters at Texas Southern University, where she is studying criminal justice (of all things), and was paid with Wal-Mart Money Orders. When she tried to cash these money orders at her local Wal-Mart she was arrested and charged with felony forgery — even though the money orders were real.
“Humiliating is not the word for it,” Gipson told KHOU news. “I was horrified. I think they singled me out because of the amount of money that it was and (thought) I was trying to get over on them.”
Nothing she did convinced the Wal-Mart manager to drop the charges. Finally, after 48 hours behind bars, the District Attorney’s office released her after she provided the purchase receipts. You might think that was the end of Ms. Gipson’s ordeal. Nope.
From KHOU:
Gipson said Wal-Mart then added insult to injury when she got a letter in the mail.
“I started to read it and thought, ‘Oh my God.’ They are asking me to pay them when it was clearly their mistake,” said Gipson.
The letter demanded Gipson pay Wal-Mart $200 to settle a shoplifting charge. It is a charge that never existed, though.
KHOU says that they contacted Wal-Mart and were told that the decision to press charges was up to the law enforcement officer at the scene. KHOU also notes that the copy of criminal complaint they obtained shows that the store manager is the one who pressed charges.
TSU student jailed on bogus Wal-Mart forgery charge [KHOU](Thanks, nick!)
More From Consumerist
-
Walmart Worker Treated Store Shelves As Personal Snack Pantry For 4 Years
-
All Of This Walmart’s Enfamil Baby Formula Is Expired
-
Petition Claims Ingredient In Gatorade Is A Flame Retardant, Unsafe For Consumption
-
Walmart Files Complaint Against Union In Attempt To Thwart Black Friday Protests
-
Don't Get Your Hopes Up If You Live In New York City & Really Want A Walmart To Move In
And of course, she needs to file mail fraud charges against walmart for sending her that false bill, as well. Might as well do it right!
” …and bless mommy and daddy and sister even though she married a dope addict and my dog gunner and dear Lord, please ,please , please let me be on the jury that hears the damages case in Wal mart vs. Gipson”
“Amen”
Texas Southern is a historically Black college. I suspect there is some racism involved in why the Walmart manager suspected they were forged.
[www.click2houston.com]
The story. LEGIT
I would print something out about this walmart and plaster it across all of the doors. Something to the effect of, “Walmart had me thrown in jail for 2 days because I shop here, are you next?” sounds nice.
@RChris173: Sadly, you are mistaken, I don’t know about other states, but here in Texas, your arrest record shows up as well, and it is often perceived the same as a conviction record. I personally have 3 burglary of a vehicle arrests, they found out I had nothing to do with it and dismissed the case, as in never went to trial, or anything like that. As in, decided that oh, we were wrong, you didn’t have anything to do with this, case dismissed. Yet, when I go to anything that requires a background check, they always ask me why I was stealing from people’s cars. This makes it very difficult to get any kind of job, even something as simple as mopping a freakin’ floor somewhere, much less a professional job, such as something in the criminal justice field. Theft charges and arrests, even without convictions or trials will totally ruin your chances of getting anything in Texas. If I were her I would have my lawyer make this point quite clearly in court, so that I could offset some of the humiliation and rejection that comes along with having a theft arrest on my record. I would offset it with a bunch of money from Wal-Mart. Hehe, and I certainly would not take a check from Wal-Mart either, since as they themselves have pointed out, a piece of paper with the Wal-Mart name on it, intended to complete a financial transaction, is apparently fraudulent and should be trusted by noone, including Wal-Mart themselves. So, I would be requesting a wire transfer or a briefcase full of cash. Seriously, I would, I would make it a part of my case. Any half competent lawyer would tear Wal-Mart apart for this in front of a jury, I don’t care how many lawyers they have on their legal team, they are going to lose this, and will probably settle for a fairly princely sum.
Good luck Ms. Gipson, my heart goes out to you, you have some hard times ahead because of Wal-Mart and I hope you rape them without the benefit of any lube!!!
Just when you thought an evil company could not get any eviler- congratulations, Walmart. You now deserve to burn in hell eleven times.
I’m with the “sue Walmart” team.
@dotcomrade: & @Lucky225:
Also because it is just good practice to leave behind a paper trail. The buyer does not know who the seller is. There have been cases of people “selling” their cars for cash then turning around and saying that the person did not pay the full amount or that they didn’t purchase it at all and that they stole it from them.
@picardia:
At the Wal*Mart in my city the purchase/cashing of money orders and checks in general (for a fee) is done at the customer service desk. The bank is for customers of the bank.
So even more of a reason that it should not have been an issue, it is for regular people without bank accounts, or whatever, to be able to get “legitimate”, “acceptable” forms of payment. However, this does not seem to be the case, because they don’t even accept their own payouts.
Man o’ man, I wish I wasn’t a college student and could afford to shop elsewhere. Anywhere else.
A little over a year ago there was another case of a black person being arrested or being black in Texas. It was at a Wells Fargo Bank in Plano, Texas. A vigilant bank teller called the police when she spotted a suspicious black man sitting at one of the manager’s desks.
He was in fact, there to transfer a car title and the manager who was helping him stepped in back to retrieve the appropriate paperwork. The teller did not bother to ask the manager of the man’s intent, she just acted unilaterally and called a SWAT team.
The poor man was arrested at gunpoint, and his wife and child (who were waiting outside in the car) were also detained at gunpoint. The police never apologized to the man and to add insult to injury, the ass-clown branch manager said on camera to the local TV news that he ‘stood behind his teller’s actions,’ despite the horrible fact that they arrested a innocent man at gunpoint.
I never saw a follow up story to this in the following weeks. It’s pretty apparent that Wells Fargo Bank had to shell out millions to silence this case and make it go away.
I suspect that the exact same thing will occur in this young woman’s case. WalMart will pay out millions to silence her. And we will unfortunately never have closure to this atrocious anecdote.
I think she could even sue for libel, seeing that they falsely imprisoned her and accused her for being a thief.
I’m not big city lawyer but that there sounds like money to me.
The only problem with all these “sue Wal-Mart” comments is that Wal-Mart
is insanely good at legal maneuvering and stalling. This lady was not
in the wrong in any way that I can tell, but Wal-Mart would tie this up
in court like you wouldn’t believe, I’ve heard of them doing it again
and again with the simplest issue.
The reason for this is of course to create enormous legal fees that
would pressure most people in trying to figure a way out of the mess and
Wal-Mart can get off by offering only paying for the legal fees and not
admitting any form out guilt.
@Jbball: Um, Target is no better
@pixiegirl1: Only conviction matters, not arrest. It will often show up in a background check though, so she may have to deal with it in some manner for a while.
@dotcomrade:
Money orders can also be paid for via debit card, at least at the post office they can…
That Wal-mart manager just might win this year’s Biggest Douche in the universe award. The cop might be in the running too.
That being said, it’s important to keep some kind of bank account, even if it’s not a checking account. Most Community Credit Unions have a member savings account that requires a very small minimum balance. The CU I bank with is only $25 and gives me priveledges of check cashing and gett cashier’s checks.
Oh, and I’ve learned to only accept money orders from the Post Office. You can cash them at any post office and know immediately if they’re legitimate or not, Plus, postal money orders waste less paper if you’re into the whole green thing.
Am I the only one who thinks there SHOULD NOT be a resolution for a while? The speculation that this may impact her career is enough for me to think that she should see a lawyer and make sure her bases are covered. The lawyer will probably be willing to take the case without cash upfront, but they’ll take about 1/3 of the settlement. A few years from now if her peers are getting jobs at a level she can’t, that should impact the settlement (if not legally it still should morally).
Western Union locations will NOT cash Western Union Money Orders. Give you an idea of how worthless they are.
Bank/Teller checks can have stop payments put on them.
She should have required cash or Certified check. Anything else, and she would have been better off accepting a personal check. At least they now clear quickly.
She should sue the m-fers.
@JiminyChristmas:
LOL what can the police do?
Ahahah how about investigate the crime?!?!? Yeah..that USED to be their jobs, remember?? Wait how old are you? Perhaps you DON’T remember living in a free country!
You don’t get to arrest someone caus esomeone else SAID they committed a crime ahaha. It is the responsibility of the police to investige FIRST. Hence false imprisonment and false arrest being serious crimes.
Welcome to the Police State America. Enjoy your stay! *slam*
Man, when you think that Wal*Mart can’t fall any lower (they’re already under the basement), something comes up and there goes Wal*Mart, proving you wrong!
Hey, hey, Wal*Mart people, if you don’t want to donate to “legitimate” causes or other stuff, you know what? don’t do it. We all can live without it! The only thing we ask for is that you don’t hire any more STUPID PEOPLE! Shut! My daughter has autism, what’s YOUR excuse!
Not only Walmart is culpable in this case, I think the local police department should also be held accountable. Insufficient evidence presented to support the charge.
And I hope that the DA cleared her record when he dropped the charges. Unfortunately, sometimes that doesn’t happen, which may cause damage when she tries to find a law enforcement job. Just being charged is enough to cause her difficulty.
Case in point, for those who think Wal-Mart should get into the banking business. If you thought it was hard to cash checks, just wait until you try to reverse bogus overdraft fees!
To the people who are concerned about arrest records – Chapter 55 of the
Texas Code of Criminal Procedure allows expungement of arrest records if
there’s no conviction – the person who has the three arrests, but no
convictions, for attempted theft from a vehicle should get the records
sealed so they don’t bite him anymore.
the media doesnt tell the whole story, and can make some things look different. Im from the area and I heard that she sole her car to someone who was not in the state, they mailed her the money orders and was coming to the state to pick the car up after she cashed them but that didnt happen. She went to jail, she didnt get the money orders back until she was released b/c she was still under investigation. Thats when she had to show reciepts, she’s a tsu student like me you can pay tuition with cash or credit at any time as long as you are registered with classes. No checks at tsu
How did this end up?
This young lady MUST file suit against them. Felony Charges, two days in jail for their errors? Hmmmm! Store manager should be fired and not allowed to work in such a capacity again. This young lady should also sue this manager individually.
I dont use Walmart any longer. I tried to return ink cartridges for a printer that died ( Too expensive to fix as it was old) so I bought new printer…tried to return ink from old one ( No receipt- it is lost)…they have me at the counter for 20 minutes saying yes the UPC codes below to Walmart etc…but we can not even give you store credit without a receipt….she threw cartridges back in the bag and handed them to me saying I had to go she couldn’t help me. All I asked for was a sore credit so I could get the correct ink for new printer….I now have $100.00 worth of ink I can not use.