Suit Alleges Racial Bias by Six Flags

Attorneys for 10 Latinos said they filed a $5-million lawsuit Thursday against Six Flags Magic Mountain, alleging racial discrimination by security guards at the amusement park.

“You can’t institute policies under the guise of security that are blatantly discriminatory,” said Jack Luellen, an attorney for the plaintiffs.

Magic Mountain executives said they could not discuss the lawsuit, but a spokeswoman said: “To say that Six Flags is discriminatory in any form is absurd.”

Luellen said the lawsuit alleges that security guards harassed, detained and sometimes ejected the plaintiffs from the park on three occasions in 1995. The plaintiffs, ages 15 to 23, are not gang members, nor were all wearing the trendy baggy attire associated with gangs when they were singled out by guards, Luellen said.

Nonetheless, Luellen said, guards were verbally abusive to the Latinos, hauling them out of line and searching them, and expelling a 17-year-old from the park although his mother was waiting for him inside.

After a gang melee at the park in 1985, Magic Mountain implemented guidelines to keep out gang members. The amusement park has settled two previous lawsuits by minorities over the policy for small monetary sums without admitting wrongdoing.