“…The jury decided on Wednesday that the hotel and Adaya violated California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act, which 
bars hotels and other business from discriminating on the basis of sex, race, color or religion…the hotel and owner were also ordered to pay approximately $440,000 in additional punitive damages to the plaintiffs…”
A Muslim hotel owner discriminated against a Jewish group during a Southern California poolside charity event by ordering removal of banners and ousting them from the pool and spa, a jury decided in awarding $1.2 million statutory damages. The suit was filed by Friends of the Israel Defense Forces, whose members had gathered two years ago at Santa Monica’s ocean-view Hotel Shangri-LA, which is owned by Tehmina Adaya. The owner is a Muslim of Pakistani descent.
The event was organized by Platinum Events, a marketing firm that had organized other gatherings at the Shangri-La after a $30-million renovation three years ago.
Workers and security guards at the Art Deco hotel were acting on Adaya’s orders when they told members of the group to get out of the pool and spa and remove banners and literature, according to trial testimony.
In her testimony, Adaya denied ordering a halt to the event for fear that her family would cut off her financing. Adaya inherited control of the hotel from her father, Ahmad Adaya, a real estate tycoon and philanthropist who died in 2006.
For more: Â http://www.jewishjournal.com/thenon-prophet/item/additional_440000_in_punitive_damages_imposed_on_hotel_shangri-la_20120816/
