A lawsuit against Comcast’s cable division alleges that a store manager humiliated the lowest performing salesperson each month with a strange ritual in which a cream pie was smashed into the employee’s face. The lawsuit claims the store manager took videos of the assaults and ordered employees to participate in the assaults and record their own videos.
A Comcast store in Plainville, Connecticut, “had a policy that the highest-ranked Retail Sales Consultant for the prior month was instructed by his or her supervisor—Ms. Peterson, the Comcast Store manager—to tie the lowest-ranked sales consultant for the prior month to a chair in the back office and thereafter assault that person by violently smashing a cream pie in their face,” the complaint alleged.
Plaintiff David Figueroa’s lawsuit said he was hired as a retail sales consultant on February 2, 2026, and was supervised by store manager Sully Fuentes Peterson. Figueroa alleges that Peterson “designed and implemented” the pie-in-face ritual to meet goals related to sales and positive responses in customer surveys.
“Defendant did not inform the Plaintiff prior to his acceptance of Defendant’s offer of employment that the Comcast Store has a policy of subjecting Retail Sales Consultants to public assaults by co-workers—at the direction of Ms. Peterson, the store manager—for the purpose of increasing Defendant’s sales and profitability,” the lawsuit said.
Comcast was negligent, lawsuit alleges
Figueroa resigned on February 27, and he alleges it was a constructive discharge. The lawsuit says the defendant, Comcast, was negligent because it “reasonably should have known” about the store management’s policies and that the policies could harm employees. Comcast “failed to properly supervise the Comcast Store’s management team,” allowing store management to humiliate employees “for the purpose of promoting the Defendant’s revenues and profits,” the lawsuit alleged.
Comcast is likely to dispute the negligence claim and may dispute at least some of the factual allegations. Comcast provided a statement to Ars today in which it said it disagrees with the complaint, but did not provide any details. Comcast also did not say whether it still employs the manager.
“The Company has zero tolerance for harassment, humiliation, or any behavior that compromises a respectful and safe workplace,” Comcast said in the statement provided to Ars. “This matter is in litigation so we will not comment on the specific allegations, other than to say that we disagree with the claims in the complaint and its characterization of the alleged events, and intend to fully respond through the legal process.”
Figueroa is seeking compensatory damages for “past and future economic losses” and for emotional distress. The complaint was filed on July 9 in a Connecticut superior court and was described in articles published yesterday by Law360 and The Desk.
Peterson maintained a chart in the back office that ranked store sales staff and “identified the employees who either had been recently assaulted or were scheduled to be assaulted in this way,” the lawsuit said. The complaint includes a photo of what is said to be the chart, which includes people’s first names followed by a month and a “pie face” emoji.
“An objective, reasonable person in Plaintiff’s position would have felt compelled to resign his employment as a result of this work atmosphere that Defendant—through its employees, servants, agents—created,” the lawsuit said. “As a result of the pervasive, repeated, and ongoing threats of violence—and actual violence inflicted on co-workers not meeting sales goals—Plaintiff resigned his position with Defendant, resulting in his constructive discharge from Defendant’s employment.”
“Assaults were videotaped”
As the case moves forward, the court could be shown video evidence of alleged pie assaults. The lawsuit claims the “assaults were videotaped by Ms. Peterson,” that she “ordered her staff to participate in these assaults and to video them,” and that Figueroa himself “witnessed and videotaped a co-worker, Ty, being tied-up and assaulted by a co-worker in the backroom of the Comcast Store.”
“Ms. Peterson ordered, was present for, and videotaped this assault, as did the Plaintiff and other co-workers,” the lawsuit said. “The co-worker who struck Ty in the face while Ty was tied-up had better sales results than Ty and, therefore, Ms. Peterson ordered him to assault his poorer performing co-worker, in front of his peers.”
The lawsuit alleges that in another incident, an assistant sales manager named Jania was assaulted with a pie because she “received a poor survey score from a customer. The Plaintiff viewed a video of Jania being assaulted on a co-worker’s phone.”
Figueroa’s lawsuit said that on February 27, he called Comcast regional manager Maranda Cody to inform her about the pie assaults and tell her that he did not feel comfortable continuing to work at the store. Cody instructed Figueroa to send her a text message memorializing his concerns and reasons for wanting to resign, the lawsuit said. Figueroa said he did not receive a response to the text message or his complaints, and went ahead with his resignation.
Comcast’s cable division has been trying to reverse customer losses over the past year by offering a five-year price guarantee and plans without data caps. The changes came after Comcast President Mike Cavanagh said in April 2025 that “we are not winning in the marketplace.”
