It was a week after New Year’s Eve, and Camille Willmington and her sister-in-law, Palmira Blanchard, decided to order a pizza instead of cooking dinner. Blanchard, recalling something she overheard earlier that week, told Willmington that Giordano’s Restaurant was out of the question because they no longer delivered to their neighborhood. Blanchard was told that they had stopped delivery service to West-Central Evanston because of high crime rates and poor driver safety.

Willmington, who considered herself a regular customer at Giordano’s, was so appalled that she decided to call and see for herself.

The events that unravelled over the seven months after Camille Willmington’s phone call and subsequent visit to the restaurant on Jan. 6 have left her with more questions and fewer answers. After filing a complaint with the city against Giordano’s, arguing that the restaurant had not delivered to her home because she is a black woman living in a black neighborhood, an investigation conducted by Evanston’s Human Relations Commission concluded in late March that the pizzeria had indeed denied Willmington and another man, Birnest Hicks, delivery service, but not on the basis of their race.

Willmington said the pizzeria’s dispatcher told her the people in her area had problems with paying and that West-Central Evanston was marred by crime. Willmington said she then requested to speak to the restaurant’s owner, Ted Mavrakis, who confirmed that his establishment had indeed stopped delivering pizza to her area, citing an incident where a driver’s safety was in danger.

But Mavrakis tells a different story of the night. According to him, the failure to deliver was based on a phone mix-up. Mavrakis said Willmington made her story up – Giordano’s doesn’t discriminate based on neighborhood or race and their record proves it, he said, and an investigation by the city confirms it.

“I’ve lived in Evanston for 10 years, and I’ve never known of any places here with more crime than others,” he said.

Still, Willmington is convinced Giordano’s did not deliver to her home that night because of her race. And even though the city has admonished the restaurant for not delivering a pizza to her home on that one occasion, Willmington says she is certain that nothing has changed – Giordano’s and other businesses with similar services are still violating Illinois’ Human Rights Act, Article 5, which prevents businesses from denying service to customers on any basis, including race.

“I wanted a new investigation,” Willmington said. “I want to see them penalized, not for them to put a plaque on the wall that says we serve equally, but to see them penalized for breaking the law.”

Seeking a new investigation, Willmington filed a complaint on May 10 with the Illinois’ Department of Human Rights and recently asked Evanston’s Human Relations Commission for an appeal to her initial complaint, which she filed jointly with Blanchard and Hicks. Meanwhile, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s Evanston/North Shore branch is in the process of conducting their own investigation of Willmington’s case, contending that Giordano’s has a policy of not delivering pizza to black customers.

Willmington’s complaint might go unresolved, but it raises several questions about public service and a business’s right to discriminate.

‘Do the right thing’

The first investigation, led by Human Relations officials Paula Haynes and Rafael Molinary, concluded that Giordano’s delivers equally to the entire city of Evanston. According to Haynes’ findings, the pizzeria had indeed denied service to Willmington and Hicks on two separate occasions, but only because a rookie night manager on duty had “misrepresented (Giordano’s) practices” and had relied on some of the concerns of the drivers who feared delivering to certain areas.

“Bad or unsafe areas are not a protected clause (in Article 5). One can conceivably say that they don’t deliver to ‘XYZ’ areas because of the high crime rate,” Haynes said. “The only way to get around that is if the complainer believes the area is predominantly black or Hispanic, but if you have a mixed neighborhood with blacks, whites, Hispanics, Asians living there, a restaurant could refuse to deliver if they believed it was a crime-ridden area.”

According to David Espinoza, a spokesman for the Illinois Department of Human Rights, Giordano’s delivery service qualifies as a public accommodation under Article 5 of the Human Rights Act, which prohibits the restaurant from refusing customers full and equal enjoyment of their services. He said the department investigates charges of discrimination of race, color, sex, national origin, age and physical/mental handicap in employment, housing and other public accommodations such as parks, financial credit, sexual harassment and higher education.

Haynes and Molinary’s investigation hinged on Article 5, leading the two through Giordanos’ delivery records and receipts from November through January. They found that Mavrakis’ establishment had delivered pizza to Willmington on several occasions prior to Jan. 6 and even had accepted credit card orders from her, which is a gamble for restaurants since a fraudulent card number could be submitted via telephone.

“We took it a step further and said we’ll accept her credit card which is … risky,” said Mavrakis. “At the time, the computer showed that she had 14 orders for $312.25. When you (spend) that much in orders, and we’ve got a credit card that we’re accepting, for her to say we’re not delivering (because of her race) is bogus.”

At the end of the investigation, and after clearing Giordano’s of the violation, Haynes recommended that Mavrakis post a mission statement in the restaurant, restating the pizzeria’s commitment to the community and to “nondiscrimination.” In addition, Haynes arranged a delivery safety training session hosted by the Evanston Police Department for interested local restaurants on April 19, which Mavrakis himself attended.

“Is it better to put someone out of business or to educate, retrain and get them to do the right thing,” Haynes said regarding her findings in the investigation. “Don’t people, as human beings, deserve the opportunity to do better. If there weren’t some forgiving people some place, where would we be?”

Protecting the public

Had the Human Relations Commission found Giordano’s guilty of violating Article 5, Haynes said she was prepared to take the next step and file a complaint, backed by their own investigation, with the state on behalf of the citizens of Evanston. The state would have had to re-investigate Giordano’s and Willmington’s story and decide how to penalize the restaurant if the complaints proved true.

“The city of Evanston does not have its own public accommodations law, it’s a state statute, so the Illinois Department of Human Rights would be the agency that would enforce any alleged violations,” Haynes said. “One of the Human Relations Committee’s objectives is to see that our businesses in town are not discriminating against our protected classes, so if we found that there appeared to be a violation of the Human Rights Act, we would file a complaint with the state on behalf of the community, because that’s who (would be) injured as the result of these delivery practices.”

Espinoza said Article 5 applies to any business, accommodation, refreshment, entertainment, recreation or transportation facility, licensed or not, whose goods or facilities are available to the public. “For example, you take a bar,” he said. “If that bar is open to the general public, that bar falls under public accommodation. If it’s open to the general public … if you’re selling any good, you’re a public accommodation.”

And although Giordano’s falls under the category of a public accommodation, the law does not clearly state whether employers can be held accountable for their employees’ actions. Molinary, who is also a practicing lawyer, said if a business’ employees kick someone out because they’re black or Hispanic, it could be held liable.

Such was t
he case with Mavrakis, who told the commission that his new night manager was responsible for the mix-up with Willmington. One of Haynes’ conclusions drawn from the final reports stated that Giordano’s was only “lacking a methodology of informing employees of policies and practices” of the restaurant, allowing employees to use their own judgment and bias in the decision-making process.

After searching police reports, Haynes found there was no significant evidence to prove that delivery personnel had been victimized in the West-Central area. Also, more than 2,000 of the restaurant’s orders were reviewed and Haynes said deliveries were made in every ward, including areas with predominantly black residents.

“Clearly, the night manager may not have realized that (Willmington had placed orders in the past) or maybe there had been recent incidents that made her hesitate to do something that they normally would have done,” Molinary said. “The incidents, in terms of violence and safety issues, would be a defense (for Giordano’s), and then you have to prove that it’s a pattern and that it cuts against Hispanics or blacks or Chinese.”

With safety as a defense, and a gray area hanging over whether or not employers are responsible for their employees’ actions, Molinary said he is uncertain about the way the state will handle Willmington’s complaint. Even if Giordano’s is found guilty of selectively delivering, Molinary said the penalty would not go beyond fining the restaurant and financial compensation for Willmington.

“Even if the state finds (Giordano’s) guilty, the state does not yank anyone’s license,” Molinary said. “In civil rights, all they do is order the place not to do it again and they bind them if they are receiving state funds. In other words, civil rights violations are taken lightly, especially in terms of imposing major horror on establishments.”

But Willmington and the NAACP aren’t asking for Giordano’s to be shut down. Even if Giordano’s is fined, it’s the lesson learned that counts – to know that people can’t be ignored.

“We have one simple thing: There’s a law – we want it complied with by any company that holds itself out to serve the public,” said Bennett Johnson, president of the Evanston/North Shore NAACP. “The Evanston Human Services Commission is not serving the rights of minorities – they spend too much time protecting the interests of the city.”

Giordano’s: ‘It never occurred’

Four months after Giordano’s was cleared by Evanston’s Human Relations Commission, Mavrakis continues to deny that his restaurant has a policy of selective delivery. Mavrakis’ account of the events also differs from Willmington’s at several key points, including the details of their initial conversation and her accusation that Mavrakis himself said he would not deliver to her neighborhood.

“We never had that issue (with selective delivering) ever,” he added. “It never occurred.”

Mavrakis also said his drivers have had problems with crime, but not significant enough to impede delivery service to any particular area.

“We had a driver who (someone) tried to rob to get his money but we didn’t have to file (a police report) because the driver was not injured,” he said.

Contrary to Haynes’ report, in which Mavrakis blames the incident on an inexperienced night manager, Giordano’s owner told The Daily that no one from his establishment used crime as an excuse not to deliver to Willmington’s home. Mavrakis said Willmington was not delivered to because of some confusion caused by the restaurant’s phone: When his busy wait staff saw the out-of-area phone number on the caller ID from Willmington’s cell phone, they told her that they don’t deliver to that area.

He said Willmington fabricated the idea of Giordano’s not delivering to West-Central Evanston because of crime.

“She’s not telling the truth,” Mavrakis said. “She came in one day, bank in her hand, threatening that she was going to close us down.”

Mavrakis is referring to the day Willmington was denied delivery. Haynes’ report stated that Willmington and Blanchard showed up at Giordano’s asking for a phone number to the company headquarters so she could file a complaint.

When things got heated in the restaurant, Mavrakis called the police to have the two women removed. Willmington and Blanchard say Mavrakis pushed one of them so they’d get out of the way of customers, but the officer who handled the situation denied those allegations, according to Haynes’ report.

“I was at the restaurant when she came in, and I told her to look at our computer to see if there were restrictions in her area,” Mavrakis said. “If we don’t deliver in Evanston, where do we deliver?”

Answering the call

“Even in Haynes’ findings, it states that people are being refused delivery, but not because of race. If they cannot pin-point race, what is it due to? ” Willmington said on Tuesday. “When I spoke to Human Relations last week, they said they don’t want to see people penalized, they want to see people changing. What’s to say they won’t do it two years down the line?”

Whether or not Giordano’s refused delivery to Willmington on Jan. 6 because she was black may never be provable. There is currently no law stating a business has to serve the public regardless of safety risks. And since businesses are not required by the city to get a permit to deliver, there is no law stating that a business must deliver within the city limits.

Some Evanston businesses openly admit that they don’t deliver to areas where their drivers feel uncomfortable. Ald. Joe Kent (5th), in whose ward Willmington lives, was refused service by a restaurant that delivers only to “safe” areas.

Two years ago, Kent ordered food from Carmen’s Pizzeria, 1012 Church St., while he was living on the 2100 block of Darrow Avenue, and was denied delivery service because someone at a building near his had robbed one of the restaurant’s drivers. He said Carmen’s drew a line around that area and deemed it unsafe because of the robbery.

“My basic feeling then, when this happened to me, was that if there is a certain area that is too bad for you to deliver to, then stop delivering all over,” Kent said. “In my case, when you start drawing circles around certain areas, and you’re discriminating against good lawful, law-abiding people, then you’re in the wrong.”

John Boling, an assistant manager at Papa John’s Pizza, 1743 Benson Ave., said he has never had to refuse delivery while working at the pizzeria’s Evanston location, but he said he would not force a driver who thought an area was unsafe to make a delivery against his or her own will.

“At this job, there’s no way I can force them to go somewhere they think is dangerous,” Boling said. “If (the driver) says they won’t deliver there, I say (to the client) that my driver is not comfortable delivering there and that they can pick it up.”

Kent said he believes selective delivery is more prevalent than reported. He said few people are willing to file the charges and follow through with them.

“The first thing you have to do is take it seriously – you cannot hang up the phone, be mad and go to another restaurant,” Kent said. “I filed those charges because I believed at that time that it was happening to some other person who just wanted to order a pizza.

“As long as it’s let go, it’s going to happen to someone else,” he added.

That’s exactly what Willmington, who is still waiting for the state to begin reviewing her case, is afraid of. She said she’s pursuing her case against Giordano’s in order to open some eyes.

“Even if Giordano’s is fined $1, it’s the fact that they have to answer to it,” Willmington said. “Now, when someone does complain, they’ll listen.”