Man masturbates on woman at Dollar Tree during string of assaults at store, lawsuit says

A woman has sued Dollar Tree, saying the national retail chain is at fault for a barrage of reported sexual assaults that occurred in one Texas store.

An attorney for the woman, who was not named in the lawsuit filed May 20 in Harris County, said a worker at a Dollar Tree in Houston told her she was the third sexual assault victim in four days at the store.

All of the alleged assaults involved a man who matched the same physical description, according to the lawsuit.

The woman’s attorneys have filed a negligence lawsuit against Dollar Tree, which attorneys say should have acted better to prevent the assaults from occurring.

McClatchy News reached out to Dollar Tree on Wednesday, May 21, and is awaiting a response.

‘We got another one’

On Dec. 5 inside the Houston store in River Oaks Plaza, the woman was shopping as her friend was in another aisle, according to the lawsuit. A man is accused of approaching her and “saying sexually explicit things to her.”

She quickly left the aisle and found her friend, telling her they needed to leave, attorneys said. As the friend was purchasing her items, the victim saw the man ride away from the store on a bicycle.

When the women were getting into their vehicle, the friend noticed “something wet and sticky all over the back” of the woman’s sweatshirt, according to lawsuit. That’s when, attorneys say, the woman realized the man had masturbated on her.

The women went back inside the store to tell workers of the alleged assault. Attorneys said the workers indicated she was not the first victim.

“The clerk shouted to her manager in the back office, ‘We got another one,’ and then informed Plaintiff that this was the third assault in four days in the store by a man who matched the physical description of the perpetrator provided by Plaintiff,” the lawsuit said.

Similar incidents also occurred in the shopping center leading up to the Dollar Tree incident, a security guard said, according to the lawsuit. The accused abuser was unable to be located.

Since the Dec. 5 encounter, attorneys say the woman has suffered “nightmares, significant anxiety, fearfulness and distrust of others, especially men.”

Dollar Tree caused woman’s mental anguish, lawsuit says

It’s up to the store, according to the lawsuit, to offer customers “a duty of ordinary care” to keep them safe while shopping.

“It is shocking and despicable,” sexual assault lawyer Anna Greenberg, who is among the representation for the victim, said in a statement. “How was a complete stranger able to violate my client in the middle of a weekday morning? That alone speaks to the fact Dollar Tree is not maintaining a safe environment for the people who shop there.”

Attorneys say Dollar Tree failed to hire enough workers, had not implemented proper security measures and failed to report the accused sexual in a timely fashion.

They also accused the store of failing to ban the perpetrator and warn customers of the previous assaults.

“The breaches by Dollar Tree proximately caused Plaintiff’s injuries and resulting damages, which were a foreseeable result of such negligence,” according to the lawsuit. “But for Dollar Tree’s negligent acts/omissions ... Plaintiff would not have been sexually assaulted in the store.”

The lawsuit seeks a jury trial for damages related to the woman’s “past and future mental anguish.”