Employee of Abbotsford horticulture company fired after posting racist comment on South Asian’s fatal accident

Sohan Singh Sidhu

ABBOTSFORD’S TerraLink Horticulture Inc. has fired an employee, Dillon Mazzei of Mission, a forklift driver, for posting a disgusting racist comment on his Facebook account regarding the tragic fatal accident of a South Asian senior who had been participating in the Canada Day parade in Abbotsford with the Indo-Canadian Seniors Society.

Using laughing emoticons and racist slurs (“f–king Hindu” and “sh-t skins”), Mazzei wrote on Monday: “To [sic] bad more of them didn’t fallout [sic].” On his now deleted Facebook he said he was from Port Coquitlam and had studied at Samuel Robertson Technical Secondary.

Sohan Singh Sidhu, 65, fell out of a truck and was struck by the trailer it was pulling on July 1 at the intersection of Simon Avenue and Gladwin Road. He had been here on a visit from India since mid-April. He was transported to hospital by BC Ambulance Service with serious injuries and later succumbed to his injuries.

On Tuesday, Mazzei’s boss, Stan Loewen, President and CEO of TerraLink Horticulture Inc, fired him and posted the following on his company’s Facebook:

“TerraLink is strongly opposed to the racist and hateful comments expressed yesterday on Facebook. The individual does not represent our company and did this on his own initiative without our knowledge. We completely disavow his views and his employment with TerraLink was immediately terminated today.

“We are publicly stating that TerraLink’s values are for inclusiveness of all people who make up the fabric of society. Given the nature of the comments, we particularly wish to inform the Indo-Canadian community that we are supportive of them. We stand with the Indo-Canadian community who are our friends and business colleagues. Together we mourn the loss of Sohan Singh Sidhu who tragically died in the accident following the Canada Day parade.

“For more than four decades the ownership of TerraLink, its management and staff have promoted equality and equal rights for all. We urge others to do so to help remove hate and discrimination from all walks of life. We are multiethnic, multicultural and multigenerational. We consciously work towards fairness and goodwill towards all people and will continue to do so.

“We express our deep condolences to the grieved family.”

(Abbotsford News broke the story on Tuesday)

 

 

 

 

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