Mrs. Cortese was arrested on June 13 at Goodkind's Groceries in Mylde Manors, a quiet neighborhood in Queens, New York, after she was observed speaking loudly to Gladys Pushin, an elderly woman, at the checkout counter. Witnesses told police that while Mrs. Cortese was unloading her shopping cart, Mrs. Pushin arrived carrying two cans of cat food and elbowed her way to the front of the line. They said Mrs. Cortese shrugged and let her go, but then, when Mrs. Pushin's husband began passing more items to his wife from behind Mrs. Cortese, she spoke up. She told Mr. Pushin that while she didn't like the way his wife had cut in front of her, she had not wanted to object, as her own elderly mother did such things, and she had felt some sympathy for his wife. She explained that his arrival with a cartful of groceries had changed the entire situation and said she was sorry, but she could not allow them to shove her aside this way because she had to finish quickly and pick up her children, whom she had left in the care of a neighbor.
Witnesses disagree as to what happened next.
Pay for your damned cat food and get out of my way. At that point, the cashier summoned the store's etiquette custodian who called the police. When the tape from the etiquette custodian's voice analyzer showed that Mrs. Cortese had exceeded the civility limit by .4 decibels, she was arrested and charged with two counts of creating a hostile environment in a public accommodation, two counts of elder abuse and one count of compromising the value of a minority-owned property. While creating a hostile atmosphere in a public accommodation carries a mandatory sentence of six years in jail followed by two years of weekly sensitivity classes, the charge of elder abuse is much more serious, carrying a sixteen-year sentence on each charge. Mrs. Cortese has so far refused an offer to have the charge of compromising the value of a minority-owned property dropped in exchange for a public apology and the funding of a scholarship for minority children.