‘Get out of my neighborhood’: Latino landscaper harassed while working in gated community

LAS VEGAS (KVVU/Gray News) – A landscaper says he was followed and harassed while on the job in a gated Las Vegas neighborhood, and part of the encounter was caught on camera.

Fernando Cesario said he believes he was targeted because he is Latino.

Cesario has been maintaining yards in the community for years and was hired for routine landscaping work. But during a recent visit, he says a man followed him around the neighborhood and accused him of trespassing.

Video taken by Cesario shows the man telling him, “Get out of my neighborhood” and calling him a “liar,” despite Cesario repeatedly stating that he had the gate code and was there to work.

“So, he followed me to the house where I was going to clean, and I was working already, and he was like, still there, like telling me, ‘You have to leave, you have to leave,’” Cesario recalled.

Cesario said he entered the neighborhood by using the gate code that he was given, but the man didn’t believe him and threatened to call police.

“I’m working, I’m using the blower, I’m using the trimmer and everything, so I mean, I was trying to be calm, you know, trying to not to make the problem bigger,” Cesario said. “Probably this is what he wants me to do, like fight back, but I didn’t do anything.”

Cesario said that the man called police. When officers showed up, they spoke with both men.

“The officer came to me, and he told me, ‘You can keep working, there’s nothing wrong with you,’” Cesario recalled.

The landscaper said this isn’t the first time he’s been harassed on the job.

“Since all this happens often, I mean, I got used to it,” he said.

Cesario said he hopes sharing his story will spark some awareness for the treatment Latino landscapers receive on a daily basis.