At least 82 women were secretly videotaped naked or partly undressed while
applying for jobs at a Los Angeles-area Hooters restaurant and changing into the
chain's distinctive uniform, police say.
Detectives in the Los Angeles suburb of West Covina were interviewing the women,
who range in age from 17 to 25, after seizing 180 video files from the personal
computer of former Hooters manager Juan Aponte, police spokesman Rudy Lopez said
on Thursday.
"The videos were of the women changing into and out of the Hooters uniform,"
Lopez said, and were taken while they applied for a job at the restaurant, which
is scheduled to open in April, at a trailer on the construction site.
At the interview they were told to change into the uniform of bright orange
shorts and a white tank-top bearing the Hooters logo and were surreptitiously
videotaped, he said.
"We're taking photographs of the girls in the videotapes and comparing them with
the applications and that's who we're trying to contact," Lopez said, adding
that while more than 1,200 women had applied it appeared that not all were
taped.
"They are appalled," Lopez said of the victims. "They are angry, upset,
emotional and had absolutely no knowledge this had taken place."
Lopez said Aponte, 32, had not been arrested but that detectives hoped to
present a case to prosecutors for possible charges within days. He said Hooters
officials had been "very, very cooperative" in the investigation.
Aponte's lawyer, Brian Michaels, declined to comment on the details of the case,
but said, "We've been cooperative with the police and we're going to remain
cooperative to the extent that it helps my client and clears this matter."
Mike McNeil, a spokesman for Hooters, said the Atlanta-based restaurant chain
was disturbed by the case.
"The restaurant chain is in no way implicated in this," McNeil said. "In our
21-year history we've never seen anything like this before and we're very
concerned about it. We're doing everything we can to cooperate."
McNeil said Hooters applicants were not expected to model uniforms during job
interviews, adding: "This manager was in clear violation of our written policies
and then went beyond that and appears to have broken the law."
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