Music store fined: Family trying piano broke gathering limits

By David Menzies
|
January 16, 2021

Fight The Fines

Reporting on and fighting the pandemic fines.

All Gladys Chan wants to do is sell musical instruments and teach people how to become musicians. So it was last January she opened her small Mississauga, Ontario, shop, Excel Music — just before the pandemic hit.

Needless to say, it has been a struggle for her to stay in business. And that struggle ramped up last month when — you guessed it — a City of Mississauga bylaw enforcement officer came calling. And he wasn’t there to buy a guitar, but rather, to issue Gladys some hefty fines. Her crime? Trying to eke out a living…

Here’s what happened: a family of three came to Gladys’ store to pick up guitar strings. The store had already closed for the day, but she let the family in to purchase the strings. The father mentioned he was also looking to buy a piano for his son.

Given that the piano he was eyeing was about $5,000, he wanted to try out the piano before purchasing it. His request was perfectly reasonable, and Gladys gave him permission to tickle the ivories.

That’s when someone who likely deserves the 2020 title of “Ultimate COVID-Karen” wandered over and looked inside the store window. You see, there is an individual who “patrols” the strip plaza where Excel Music is located, dutifully ensuring that all the merchants play by the ‘rules.’

This person presumably spotted the family in the store, and then presumably called bylaw enforcement.

A bylaw officer quickly responded to the snitch’s call, and Gladys says the officer was inexplicably belligerent from the get-go. When he came to her shop, he allegedly banged on her door and yelled, “Bylaw! Open Up!”

He went on to lecture Gladys and allegedly called her a “liar” for not knowing the rules. He then gave her two tickets totalling $1,800.

Apparently, three people of the same family in a store is tantamount to a superspreader event. But please, kindly ignore the nearby big box stores such as Walmart and Costco, in which there are hundreds of shoppers congregating…

We find it outrageous that Gladys was issued these fines. So it is that she is our latest Fight the Fines candidate.

We are going to provide Gladys with a top-notch criminal lawyer, and if you would like to help contribute to their legal fees, please visit FightTheFines.com.

Spread the Word!