I am a 17 year old girl who has a part time job at a high street store. I have been working there for around about a year and a half now. Recently since about August, a middle aged male customer has regularly been entering the store. At first he came in with a woman around about the same age as him but he was belittling her and telling her to stop being so emotional. I felt like he was a threat, but as the visits went on that became less so, he became a familiar face. Now I know that was just a power move to make him trust me. As the visits went on, he became rather overfriendly with me, exclusively talking to me and no other member of staff. I thought that was normal, and I didn’t say anything because I thought he was just a regular who enjoyed coming in for company. This particular day he came in, it was just me and an 18 year old girl on the shop floor as we were short staffed. She was on the till and I was standing back in the store, but not too far away from the store. This time I was all alone, and I didn’t have the barrier of the till protecting me. He was talking about me being a “clever girl” and despite knowing full well that I was a minor, saying how he would be able to “get me out of my shell” and “make me feel loved”. He was saying about taking me out for a drink outside of work because he ‘didn’t know I liked him in that way’. I did not give him any consent in any way, I was just talking to a regular customer. That was when he touched my breasts, and grabbed them. I moved away but then he rubbed and touched my face and said that he’d come in again to sort it out. I was dismissing it all and saying that I was busy just because I wanted him to leave, I was petrified and felt so uncomfortable. I think about that day every moment, CCTV has caught him and I have an ongoing police investigation. I can’t go on knowing that he has taken everything from me, he needs to be identified. This is not okay to happen to any woman.
