JDV Racial Profiling Incident Update

March 29, 2007 at 9:10 AM | by juliana | Comment (1)

So yesterday we ran a story about a second incident of racial profiling that occurred at a JDV Hospitality hotel, the Cathedral Hill Hotel in San Francisco.

The incident was sent to us by the guest and we posted his side of the story as well as JDV's official response. We wrote that we hadn't heard back from the guest, who goes by Solomon Jones (not Smith as we initially reported) after we emailed him. However, as luck would have it, he responded to our email yesterday afternoon. Not much has changed since his initial submission but we thought we would post his email response, after the jump, so you can draw your own conclusions.

We feel that this more than just an isolated incident for Joie De Vivre. We think they need to come clean and admit that their problem is bigger than they're willing to acknowledge.

First of all, they should have started by not lying to us when they adamantly stated that this type of situation had never happen before with Joie De Vivre. We should have known something was wrong when they were very aggressive about us not leaving the property. When the incident initially occurred, we were going to leave and check into the Westin, but the GM seemed very sincere (albeit nervous) with his apologies and his earnestness to make us happy by accommodating us in any way possible.

Since we were here on business and had a very hectic schedule, we agreed. My wife and I are in the film business (we own a number of film studios and can see our site at [redacted]).

It took a few days for the significance of the incident to really sink in, and we rediscussed checking out of the hotel, but again, the hotel management aggressively went out their way to keep us at the property (now we know why). The rest of the stay went okay, and we spoke with Chip Conley, who also seemed sincerely apologetic. In fact, Conley was so convincing that we had agreed to contact him the next time we were in town so that he could make special arrangements on our next stay.

About a month later, I e-mailed Conley about a future trip I had planned to San Francisco for my wife's birthday. We were going to try Hotel Vitale since we had heard such good things. Well, we accidentally received a bizarre e-mail from this executive assistant that detailed the racial incident at Hotel Vitale. When we read the e-mail and realized it had occurred not one month prior to our incident, we were sick to our stomachs. We felt so lied to and absolutely stunned at their sheer duplicity and disingenuous gestures.

Had we known about the Hotel Vitale incident, we never would have stayed at Cathedral Hill, much less ever considered staying with them again. We contacted Conley and told him that we knew about the Professor and his only response was the same song and dance he had given during the Professor's situation.

We hope Hotel Chatter will print this story about racial profiling at Joie De Vivre so perhaps Mr. Conley will come out of denial and this time really address the problem of racial profiling in his hotels because we do not want a single person to experience the sheer humiliation, pain, and embarrassment that we endured. Feel free to also contact us by cell [redacted] should you have any more questions. Thanks so much for your time and consideration.

Solomon & Karen

Comment (1)

Return to » JDV Racial Profiling Incident Update

Dear Mr. Conley and others that this concerns,

Yes, prejudice does still exist in America, specifically at Hotel Vitale. Despite your letter of apology and the supposed training your staff has received since the first famous incident with Professor Ngugi wa Thiong'o, you will be upset to know that nothing has changed. My husband and I, a mixed, Indian and Middle-Eastern couple, were thrown out onto the street by your racist and incompetent staff on our wedding night, 8/9/08. The level of disrespect and prejudice that your staff showed us was stunningly severe, but apparently, not uncommon for Hotel Vitale.

Below is the review I wrote of your hotel explaining our situation on www.yelp.com. I have already sent this letter to you and all of your executives, with not one single response. The only person who has contacted me in regard to this matter is manager Euan Taylor. I am sending this to you, again, before I share it with every newspaper, magazine, website and television station possible. Hotel Vitale is a grave example of the institutionalized racism that still exists in our country and you should be ashamed of yourselves.

My husband and I decided on Hotel Vitale for our wedding night after considering many other hotels. My husband worked with concierge to plan a stay that we would never forget. They planned for a limo from the hotel to pick us up from the wedding reception and take us to the hotel. He ordered champagne and strawberries and arranged for massages and spa services for the next morning.

We arrived in the limo at the hotel.... and they refused to help us. Actually, the manager, Josh Gordon, kicked us out onto the street in our tuxedo and wedding gown. Apparently, because the hotel was a gift from our parents, they needed to accompany us to the hotel on our wedding night and show identification. Keep in mind, I am South Indian, with dark hair and dark skin, often confused for Pakistani or Middle Eastern. My hands and feet were covered in the traditional Indian wedding henna, also a tradition in the Arab world. My husband is Middle-Eastern, born in Israel, and still boasts a slight accent.

We are not strangers to fine hotels, as my husband travels for business 200 days a year, staying in 4 and 5 star hotels. We SPECIFICALLY confirmed that our reservation would be pre-paid and that we had done everything necessary to make that happen. The concierge assured us that we would NOT have to worry about having a credit card stashed somewhere on our persons when arriving from our wedding. That particular aspect was never noted on our reservation, and as most people know, wedding gowns don't come with pockets! We were forced to take a $60 cab ride home and that is where we spent our wedding night.

To add insult to injury, the next day, the hotel spa attempted to charge us a 50% cancellation fee.... CHARGED TO THE SAME CREDIT CARD THEY REFUSED TO CHARGE ON OUR WEDDING NIGHT!

The worst part of this experience was the manager on duty, Josh. He was sarcastic and rude. He rolled his eyes at us and raised his voice at us. He actually felt comfortable and secure enough with their policy of bigotry to LAUGH AT US. He refused to give us his business card or his last name. I have never been treated with such disrespect. He had the nerve to suggest that we were attempting to use a fraudulent card. As though we put on a tuxedo and $5000 wedding gown and hired a limo to pick us up from someone else's wedding so we could get a free night at their "amazing hotel"? Get real. Finally, he nastily said, "I said, I can't help you", turned his back on us and walked away.

He stole our wedding night from us. A night that we can never have again. It is one thing to have a bad anniversary or birthday experience. It is another to have such a special, once-in-a-lifetime experience taken away from by a snot-nosed, bigoted asshole who woke up on the wrong side of the bed.

Hotel Vitale - you are a reflection of your weakest link.

And on another note, if the hotel had a suspicion of credit card fraud, they should have showed us to our room, followed up with the credit card company and/or the cardholder, and called the police. I'm sure that the Hotel ID Theft department of the District Attorney's office, as well as the victim of the theft, would have appreciated that.

Mr. Conley, please understand that while we might appear "young", or "untrustworthy", or "foreign" to your staff, our connections run very deep. I do not plan to stop telling this story until I feel as though something has been done to curb this extreme pattern of intolerance.

I am disappointed that you didn't find the need to respond to me already, and assure you that this will be my last attempt to elicit a response from you.

Sincerely,

Asha Jameson-Gershoni

HotelChatter

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