Interesting. It is neat to hear these kinds of things.
Yeah, there are those special situations where the employer or the employers employees who check in on references are unaware of the laws. Those moments really suck.
Story time ahead. True story. No proof though, i could go to jail for how i handled this. So as such i will never have proof for it, or share the proof. Only an idiot would gather proof against themselves for what i did to this asshole.
I had a rough time once when i had a bad reference and didn't know about it. I had no idea who it was. Once i found out though, boy was i fucking pissed. Not only was it a false accusation which i was able to prove after the fact to my most current employer. It was all over a situation which could have been avoided if my previous employer had not been a coke snorting retard.
Long story short. I applied for many jobs. All of them i was well suited for experience wise, and i had been told to come into an interview for many of them, only to be called back with in a day or two later, some before the interview only to be told i was no longer being considered. When i finally got one of them to slip up and tell me who was bad mouthing me, because after 20 lost interviews it was kind of apparent what was going on, i was LIVID. I immediately marched down to that previous employer and cornered him. To put into some perspective, i am not a very nice person when i get pissed off, and i get scary. As such, previous employer did not budge from his corner when i got him there. I will admit right now, i went a little psycho on him. In all fairness, i had just gone 3 months with out a job and it was starting to get really fucking annoying.
I will call him Trevor. Why Trevor? Because i have met 10 Trevors in my life so far. All of them have been absolute douchebags. I apologize to the Trevors who are not douche bags, but it is the truth. Funny thing is, my Uncle is a Trevor as well. Anyways....
Me: "YOU ASSHOLE! I LEFT THIS PLACE ON GOOD GRACES AND YOU TOLD ME THAT YOU WOULD GIVE ME A GOOD REFERENCE AND THEN I FIND OUT THAT YOU HAVE BEEN TELLING PEOPLE THAT I STOLE FROM YOU!?"
Trevor: "REMOVE YOURSELF FROM THIS OFFICE OR I WILL CALL THE POLICE!"
Me: Pulls out phone cable then Yells to back staff who hate this prick to not bother, boss is safe but getting a good lecture. "OH really?"
Me continued: Grabs bosses cellphone "You don't get to have this either." "I did not steal anything from you, you two face son of a fucking bitch." "What is it i somehow stole from you?" "This better be a good one, because from the amount of hell you have caused me, i would assume that you thought i had stole money from you, and punched your kid in the face."
Trevor: "You ate a meal, and didn't pay for it."
Me: "YOU HAVE BEEN RUINING MY LIFE OVER A FUCKING SANDWICH?!?!?!" "AND FRIES!?!?!"
(By this time, there was a crowd of employees behind me, just staring at the boss.)
ME: "THIS IS A FUCKING RESTAURANT, AND IN RESTAURANTS YOU FEED YOUR FUCKING EMPLOYEES A FREE MEAL EVERY SINGLE FUCKING DAY!" (Apparently to my amusement, this is not required by law,but most restaurants do this.) "AT THE VERY LEAST, you could have docked my paycheck the 7$ it cost you!" "Instead you laid me off, and badmouthed me, TO 20 DIFFERENT JOBS?!? You sir are a piece of shit that isn't even worth my time anymore."
Trevor: "GOOD! NOW GET OUT OF MY OFFIc...." *Gets cut off as i give him a haymaker to his jaw.
Me: "This has just started." "Mikey, go make me the same sandwich that caused all of this."
Mikey: "You want extra cheese and meat with that?"
Me: "And some extra habanero peppers please." Mikey goes off to make a sandwhich for me. The rest of the crew is still just awestruck. This jackass has been a complete dick with everyone since i first got the job there, and apparantly only was getting worse since i left.
Trevor: "IF ANYONE HERE MAKES HIM ANY FOOD YOUR FIRE... Another haymaker to the jaw from myself "You're not allowed to talk you dumb son of a bitch."
Crowd: "FUCK YOU TREVOR!" "YOU FIRE MIKEY AND WE ALL QUIT!"
(Kind of hard for a restaurant to be run when there are no employees.)
a few people from Crowd: "AND, since you seem so willing to badmouth your previous employees we will be doing the same about this place after we leave. Or at least i will, since i quit right now. By the way, i am going to go have a sandwich too." 3 people walk off, and make a sandwich. (This is a rough approximation of what they said, since they all said roughly the same thing, with a slight difference in choice of words.)
Me: "I don't know about you Trevor, but you seem to be gathering a lot of enemies here really fucking fast. You might want to do something about that."
Crowd: "You tell him CSoF, This dick head has fired 4 other people since you left, and for the same damn thing."
CRACK Hit Trevor with Provinces phone book (It's about 1000 pages.)
Me: "I am going to leave this office Trevor. Before that though, two things are going to happen You are going to get on the phone with those people and offer their jobs back with a 7$ pay raise. I am going to dial their numbers for you. Why 7$? Because that seems the appropriate number considering the cost of a simple fucking sandwich."
"Second, you are going to give me $3,000 for the harm you have caused me due to your douche baggery. I was going to force you pay me $5,000, but since i hit you a few times, you are going to need some cash for that medical bill. Your jaw will be needing it."
Trevor: "I'M NOT GIVING YOU A SINGLE FUCKING DIME OR HIRING THEM BACK!" "I WILL SEE THAT YOU ROT IN A JAIL CELL....." CRACK!!!! "flyou bhashtahd, flou browk mah jaw."
Me: "I am just getting started you stupid ass dumb fucking idiot." "I guess you wont be doing the talking on the phone any more." "I'll do it for you." Starts dialing the number of the first person.
Me to 4 different phone calls: "You have a job at the old restaurant again if you want it. The boss has even been so kind as to agree to a 7$ raise for you. You have to get here today though. This offer will only last as long as i have him on the ropes."
Reply from the one person who did not take offer: "Well, i have a new job now, and it pays much better than the old one, but how did you manage to get that dumb shit to do this?"
Me: "I would let him tell you himself, but his jaw isn't very cooperative right now."
Guy on phone: "Good!" "You have my blessing, not that it matters much."
Me: "Okay guys" I say to the crowd "This has been long enough, and i think Trevor gets the point. We all know what has happened here, and i hope you all know better than to go behind my back and fuck me over." "You should all get back to work though, since the other 4 fellas are handling the kitchen on their own right now." "I am going to leave here now." "Joe, i want you to watch Trevor please to make sure he doesn't try anything, if you would?"
Joe: "No problem CSoF, just make sure to get Mikey to make me a sandwich too please, i am kind of hungry now."
Me: "Joe, i will make one for you myself, if Mikey will allow it."
Mikey made it instead. I left the restaurant, moved out of the city, and found a job somewhere else.
I got paid the 3,000 directly from the safe. The people who were fired were rehired, only to have to find jobs again 8 months later, since the boss decided to get brave after his jaw healed. The whole staff quit, and took him to court after he tried to refire those people. That restaurant went out of business. My current boss, who is the only other person in my area to know the complete details to all of this hired me on the spot after talking to Mikey, my old supervisor instead of the boss. When my boss asked me if i do stuff like that normally and if he should be worried, i replied with this.
Me: "I sincerely hope not. I broke a bone in my hand the day i taught that fucker a lesson. I really don't want to have a repeat of that." "I don't think that this will be an issue here since you are a University professor, and those tend to be smarter than the typical coke snorting stupid fuck like he is."
Current Boss: "Okay, welcome to the plant."
To this day, i have never heard of anything from Trevor, other than that his old chain of fast food restaurants he had going on the side are going out of business as well. Apparently the old crew has been collectively suing him, for the past 3 years. The last i heard from Mikey, he owns his own house now. As for me getting into trouble for it all. That is the funny part. Mikey told me the judge had only this to say.
"While we do not condone the actions of this individual, it has come to our attention through the words of the staff that his actions were the only thing that has brought this whole debacle to our attention."
"We take things like references very seriously. If all employers were to act in the way Trevor has, our cities would be much worse off, and no one would be able to find a job."
"As such, while this court would like to see justice done for the acts of violence this individual has committed, we have no real evidence other than abundant hearsay which is not enough to charge this individual with. We hope he or anyone else ever has to deal with a person such as Trevor again. People like Trevor are exactly what is wrong with our country right now. Since the court cannot do anything about these individuals like Trevor until the matter of fact has been brought towards the court, which is near impossible due to how employers blackball people in secret, it is only natural that someone took it into their own hands."
Mikey finished telling me after that, that the judge may have been biased towards us, since his last name was the same as one of the old workers who was fired before i was hired. Apparently that person was fired for thinking the restaurant fed their employees a meal too.
Believe it or not.