NYC taxi driver fined $25K for refusing ride to black family and picking up white women instead
Cynthia Jordan and 17-year-old daughter Bria said a taxi driver locked his doors and insisted he was off duty when they tried to hail a ride in Midtown in 2013.
A black woman from Queens struck a blow for every African-American ever ignored by a yellow cab when a judge fined a biased taxi hack $15,000 for refusing to pick up the woman and her daughters.
Instead, he opened his door for a pair of white passengers.
Cynthia Jordan and her daughters were trying to get to a family birthday party from Midtown two years ago when cabbie Baqir Raza locked his doors and insisted he was off duty.
But before Jordan could yell, “taxi,” again, Raza was putting out the welcome mat for two white women just 25 feet away, according to a Human Rights Commission report.
“‘Are you kidding me?” Jordan screamed at the driver after racing to confront him. “You picked up these two … white b---hes … instead of me and my family. I’m gonna report you.”
The rude cabbie shot back, “Go ahead and report me.”
And report him she did, first to the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission, which fined Raza $200 after he pleaded guilty.
Yellow taxi hack Baqir Raza was ordered to pay $25,000 in a racial discrimination case.
Then, Jordan decided to take the cabbie for a ride, filing a complaint with the Commission on Human Rights, which took up the racial discrimination case.
With her youngest daughter — 16 at the time — upset at the hack’s rank bias, Jordan decided to get justice.
“I just wanted to let her know that you don't just have to just take it,” Jordan told the Daily News. “I've been taking it for years. It's not fair.”
Administrative Law Judge Raymond Kramer said Raza showed “willful discrimination” against Jordan, an accounting executive at a stock transfer firm, and her family.
“Baqir Raza refused to transport Ms. Jordan and her daughters on the basis of their race and color,” Kramer wrote in the July 27 decision.
The judge recommended that Raza be ordered to pay $10,000 to Jordan and a $15,000 civil penalty, plus get anti-discrimination training.
The cabbie refused to give Cynthia Jordan (pictured) and her two daughters a ride in front of Macy’s in Midtown in 2013, instead picking up two white women nearby.
DNAinfo first reported the decision.
Jordan testified that even though she usually does not use such language, she was so angered at the time, she accused the driver of picking up “white b---hes.”
“It’s difficult when you’re put in those kind of situations and it happens from time to time,” she testified.
“I felt like (the cab driver) was just not doing the right thing,” Jordan’s daughter, Chiley Holder, testified. “I just felt like he dismissed us because of the way we look.”
Raza and the medallion owner, Jafar Raza, could not be reached for comment.
Raza blew off the trial, but argued in a 2014 court document that a white passenger cut off Jordan and hopped right into the taxi once it became available, according to Kramer’s decision.
The judge didn’t buy that defense, pointing to trip records.
Cynthia Jordan and 17-year-old daughter Bria said a taxi driver locked his doors and insisted he was off duty when they tried to hail a ride in Midtown in 2013.
A black woman from Queens struck a blow for every African-American ever ignored by a yellow cab when a judge fined a biased taxi hack $15,000 for refusing to pick up the woman and her daughters.
Instead, he opened his door for a pair of white passengers.
Cynthia Jordan and her daughters were trying to get to a family birthday party from Midtown two years ago when cabbie Baqir Raza locked his doors and insisted he was off duty.
But before Jordan could yell, “taxi,” again, Raza was putting out the welcome mat for two white women just 25 feet away, according to a Human Rights Commission report.
“‘Are you kidding me?” Jordan screamed at the driver after racing to confront him. “You picked up these two … white b---hes … instead of me and my family. I’m gonna report you.”
The rude cabbie shot back, “Go ahead and report me.”
And report him she did, first to the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission, which fined Raza $200 after he pleaded guilty.
Yellow taxi hack Baqir Raza was ordered to pay $25,000 in a racial discrimination case.
Then, Jordan decided to take the cabbie for a ride, filing a complaint with the Commission on Human Rights, which took up the racial discrimination case.
With her youngest daughter — 16 at the time — upset at the hack’s rank bias, Jordan decided to get justice.
“I just wanted to let her know that you don't just have to just take it,” Jordan told the Daily News. “I've been taking it for years. It's not fair.”
Administrative Law Judge Raymond Kramer said Raza showed “willful discrimination” against Jordan, an accounting executive at a stock transfer firm, and her family.
“Baqir Raza refused to transport Ms. Jordan and her daughters on the basis of their race and color,” Kramer wrote in the July 27 decision.
The judge recommended that Raza be ordered to pay $10,000 to Jordan and a $15,000 civil penalty, plus get anti-discrimination training.
The cabbie refused to give Cynthia Jordan (pictured) and her two daughters a ride in front of Macy’s in Midtown in 2013, instead picking up two white women nearby.
DNAinfo first reported the decision.
Jordan testified that even though she usually does not use such language, she was so angered at the time, she accused the driver of picking up “white b---hes.”
“It’s difficult when you’re put in those kind of situations and it happens from time to time,” she testified.
“I felt like (the cab driver) was just not doing the right thing,” Jordan’s daughter, Chiley Holder, testified. “I just felt like he dismissed us because of the way we look.”
Raza and the medallion owner, Jafar Raza, could not be reached for comment.
Raza blew off the trial, but argued in a 2014 court document that a white passenger cut off Jordan and hopped right into the taxi once it became available, according to Kramer’s decision.
The judge didn’t buy that defense, pointing to trip records.
