PINEVILLE, N.C. -- A Pineville store manager has been fired after a pregnant woman says she was falsely accused of hiding merchandise under her shirt.
"I'm very pregnant, I don't need any additional stress," said Shirell Bates, who is 34 weeks pregnant with twins.
"I'm excited," Bates said, rubbing her belly with a smile.
Bates decided to make a quick run to Staples to stock up on some back-to-school supplies for her son Friday afternoon.
"I figured I would go in there, grab a few items and be on my way," she said.
She said she spent about 15 minutes walking around the store.
"About half of the time, I had a store employee helping me find the items I needed," Bates said.
When she was finishing up, she checked her cart to make sure she had everything she needed and got in line to pay.
"Things took a turn at the register, mid-transaction," Bates said.
The mom said a police officer approached her and asked her to step aside.
"I initially didn't think anything of it," she recalls. But then, she said, the officer asked her what was under her shirt.
"Because I'm pregnant with twins, 34 weeks, I figured it just might have been trying to make conversation, so I was like 'oh, twins!'" she said.
Bates said the officer wasn't making small talk.
"That answer wasn't good enough because that same question was asked again: 'Are you sure there isn't anything else under your shirt?"
Bates said that's when she realized she was being accused of shoplifting and concealing the merchandise.
She said there were other customers that were beginning to watch what was happening. So before the officer could ask for the third time, she pulled up her shirt to show him her stomach.
"I wanted to just hide under the blankets and just crawl under it and hide from the world," Bates said. "I felt so ashamed, so humiliated."
She said the officer told her that he was asked by the store manager to confront her. She quickly paid for her items and left.
But before she left the parking lot, she thought more about what had just happened.
"I can't imagine this happening to another mom, I need to say something," Bates told herself.
So, she went back into the store and asked to speak to the manager. The woman came out and Bates said she told her that they have dealt with a lot of people trying to conceal merchandise in their clothing. Bates said the manager told her she made the decision to have an officer confront her.
Bates was in disbelief.
"When people are pregnant, your radar goes off that they could potentially look like they're stealing? Is that how the store operates? Is that how you operate as a manager?" she questioned.
Bates said the manager refunded her money and said sorry. An apology Bates said was coerced and never would have happened if she hadn't come back into the store.
So, she took her encounter to social media. By Monday, the interaction created a viral firestorm of people coming to Bates' defense.
Staples released the following statement after Friday's incident:
“On Friday at our Pineville location, a Staples’ manager mistakenly assumed a customer was shoplifting and reported this assumption to a police officer visiting the store.
The police officer questioned the customer and quickly confirmed there was no theft. Based on the outcome, Staples’ issued a full refund to the customer.
Staples has since conducted a full investigation into the matter, and determined that the manager in question did not follow correct protocol and also failed to adhere to our existing policy on how to interact with our customers.
As a result of this finding, the manager has been terminated and Staples has apologized to the customer. At Staples, we want all customers to feel welcome in our stores, and work with our associates to foster an inclusive culture. As an organization, we would like to apologize to the customer as that was not the case in this instance.”
Bates said she would like Staples to reach out to her directly to apologize, rather than just issuing a statement to the media.
She said she plans to boycott the supply chain from now on and hopes the company learns a lesson about how to treat its customers.
"You shouldn't treat any human being like that," she said.