More than a month after a customer sued a Massage Envy parlor in Fort Worth, the company and a former employee are being sued for alleged sexual abuse at a Dallas location.
The lawsuit was filed Monday by Houston-based company Blizzard Greenberg PLLC in a Dallas County court. The defendants named in the lawsuit are Massage Envy, Trinity Health Spa – which owns and operates Massage Envy franchises in Dallas-Fort Worth – and Tarence Harrison, the former employee accused in the lawsuit of sexually assaulting his female colleague.
On December 27, 2023, the female employee had a massage appointment with Harrison at Massage Envy located at 3699 McKinney Ave. in Dallas, where they both worked at the time, the lawsuit said.
According to the complaint, the woman worked at the Massage Envy franchise for 15 years.
Before the massage began, the plaintiff told Harrison she didn’t want him to work on her legs because they are sensitive and she doesn’t like it, the lawsuit alleges. When Harrison returned to the room after she undressed and lay down, he began the massage with compressions from the feet up, including her legs, she said.
When the accuser repeated that she didn’t want him to touch her legs, Harrison said he was “just trying to get an idea of what needed to be done,” according to the lawsuit.
🚨 More top stories from our newsroom:
→ HEB announces opening date for Mansfield supermarket
→ Here’s a look at how many illegal voters Tarrant’s election integrity unit investigated
→ ‘Patch Cafe’ from TV’s ‘Landman’ opens as a real restaurant
[Get our breaking news alerts.]
He then loosely loosened her back to begin working on the area and the plaintiff tucked the sheet under her own hips, believing Harrison would not secure the curtains, the lawsuit said.
After finishing working her back, Harrison slipped his hands under her underwear and began massaging her buttocks, the suit alleges. She asked him to stop and he responded with “just seeing what needed to be done,” and she asked him to stop a second time, at which point he did, according to the complaint.
The woman said she felt shocked and scared by Harrison’s behavior and that her concern was to try to stay safe without escalating the situation, the complaint said.
Harrison then moved to massage her legs again as the accuser told him, “Don’t touch my legs.” Please don’t touch my legs,” the accuser claims.
Only after she explained to him that she was a victim of abuse and did not feel comfortable touching her legs did Harrison stop and say, “Yes, I can tell you to hide your body,” the suit says .
He continued the massage by moving her arm in an unnatural manner, causing pain in her shoulder, the complaint alleges. He rolled the plaintiff over and placed her face up on the table, but again he did not close the curtains to prevent her chest from being exposed, the lawsuit said.
Harrison reached under her shoulder and began working on the area, requiring the accuser to quickly cover herself and pull her breast away so she couldn’t be touched, the complaint alleges. He responded with, “Oh yeah, I think you should keep that out of the way,” the complaint states.
The massage ended shortly afterward and the woman rushed out of the building to her car, prosecutors said.
As a result of the abuse, the woman suffered severe mental anguish, emotional distress and psychological trauma, the complaint alleges.
The woman notified the clinic manager, who then reported the assault to the Trinity Health Spa district and assistant district managers. But instead of firing Harrison as required by Massage Envy’s zero-tolerance policy, Trinity Health Spa opted to retrain him, the lawsuit said.
That was Harrison’s third training on draping during massages, the suit said.
The Massage Envy franchise expected Harrison and the plaintiff to continue working together, she claims. She told the assistant district manager she was concerned Harrison would repeat the violation against a customer, the complaint said.
Her superiors continued to refuse to fire Harrison, and the assistant district manager also revealed that she was the one who told Harrison that his colleague was complaining about him, the lawsuit said. The plaintiff states that she never gave the manager permission to disclose this information to him.
It wasn’t until the prosecutor sent an email about the attack on human resources that an investigation into Harrison began, leading to his firing, according to the lawsuit.
During the investigation and before he was fired, Harrison was taken to a Massage Envy at 3100 Texas Sage Trail in Fort Worth, the complaint said. This location is the same Massage Envy that was sued by a customer in April after a therapist made lewd comments to her and touched her inappropriately.
Harrison’s transfer was another violation of company policy as employees must be suspended and removed from their work schedules until an investigation is completed, according to the lawsuit.
