Celebrity chef Paula Deen and her brother Earl "Bubba" Hiers are under the spotlight for a videotaped court deposition wherein Deen admitted to using racial slurs. The two are the subjects of a formal lawsuit filed by Lisa Jackson, a former manager for Deen's Savannah, Georgia restaurants. Jackson sites sexual and racial harassment in the workplace.
The case filed in 2012 alleges that Deen and Hiers "often expressed sexist and racist sentiments," according to The Hollywood Reporter.
In a brief transcript of the court deposition revealed on CNN, Deen says she never made racial jokes but she did admit to using the "N" word "when a black man burst into the bank that I was working at and put a gun to my head," adding that she "didn't feel real favorable towards him." She also admitted to other uses of the word after that incident.
Jackson also accused Deen of telling insensitive racial jokes.
THR reports that, she claims Deen said: "Well what I would really like is a bunch of little n***ers to wear long-sleeve white shirts, black shorts and black bow ties, you know in the Shirley Temple days, they used to tap dance around." She added that would be a "true Southern wedding," but they couldn't push through with the plan because "the media would be on [her]" for planning it.
Deen's lawyer says that she never condones the use of racial slurs and calls the allegations in Jackson's lawsuit false.
However, Radar Online reports that in the deposition videotape, Deen does admit to telling the insensitive racial joke, saying that she got the idea from a restaurant she and her dined at.
"I mean, it was really impressive. That restaurant represented a certain era in America...after the Civil War, during the Civil War, before the Civil War...It was not only black men, it was black women...I would say they were slaves."
As for Deen's brother, Hiers, he is alleged to have downloaded porn onto a computer in an office he shares with Jackson. She also says he printed out lesbian porn and added the caption "why gay marriage should be legal."
Jackson worked at Deen's Lady and Sons restaurant as well as Bubba's Seafood and Oyster House for five years, after which she quit when the administration failed to take appropriate action after her multiple complaints.