Union Gospel Mission suspends employee after video shows man allegedly filming woman on Vancouver street

A staff member at Vancouver’s Union Gospel Mission (UGM) has been suspended after a video was posted online, showing a man allegedly filming a woman without her consent.

The video shows an interaction between the woman, sitting in her vehicle, and the man she claims was recording her from the street. During their interaction, the man said he is a “volunteer in the women’s shelter” at UGM.

UGM’s Media Relations Manager, Nicole Mucci, explained that the man in the video is not a volunteer, but rather a UGM staff member, adding that he works in the kitchen.

“This individual’s role — he actually never worked directly with women and children in our Women and Families building, and he was never in a position of ever being unsupervised with any of our tenants or program participants,” said Mucci.

She says the mission takes the video’s content very seriously.

“Our people and culture team immediately launched an investigation; he was suspended; and we were able to start to take steps to just really ensure that our community is as safe as possible.”

The woman who posted the video says the incident happened around noon Thursday. Later, the man allegedly followed the woman to a coffee shop before shouting at her. 

In the video, the woman can be heard repeatedly asking the man to delete any footage of her. The man appears to be holding a beer can.

Mucci says UGM is grateful to the woman and other concerned citizens who let the organization know about the video.

“We hope that our community members and that those who are concerned feel assured that we are responding to the contents of the video with just complete urgency and diligence. We share those concerns equally, and we really want to ensure that the safety of the women and the families that we serve always stays our highest priority.”

1130 NewsRadio has reached out to the Vancouver Police Department for more information.