Judge Recommends $25,000 Fine For Cabbie Who Turned Away Black Passengers

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- A New York City cab driver accused of refusing to pick up three potential passengers because they were black may have to pay a $25,000 fine.

Administrative Law Judge Richard Kramer said cabbie Baqir Raza "discriminated based on race and color'' when he turned down Cynthia Jordan and her two daughters in October, 2013.

Jordan, an accounting executive, and her adult and teen daughters were trying to get to a family birthday party when they spotted Raza's cab in Midtown.

According to the judge's recap, the women testified in February that the cab's "available'' light was on, but Raza told them he was going off duty.

He then picked up two white women just 25 feet away.

"Are you kidding me?'' Jordan ran up and exclaimed, adding some coarse language out of anger, she testified. "When someone just doesn't want to pick you up because of what you look like, it's not a good thing for my daughter to see. (To) have to deal with things like this is not right.''

The fine recommended by Judge Kramer is subject to city Human Rights Commission approval.

In a written statement, Raza told the rights agency that the white women simply got in when another rider got out.

"It is unfair that I am in this current situation because of something I personally had no control over,'' he added.

His own trip log, however, showed the dropoff and pickup were about two minutes apart, and he admitted violating city taxi rules against unjustly refusing passengers and paid a $200 fine, said the judge.

Complaints about race-based taxi refusals have percolated for years in New York and elsewhere.

Actor Danny Glover filed a 1999 complaint with New York's Taxi and Limousine Commission saying several available cabs had passed him by. Hundreds of cabbies were accused of refusing passengers based on race, gender or other improper factors in a subsequent undercover crackdown.

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