9 Biggest Scandals In Dollar Tree History

The following article includes reports of sexual harassment, death, and sexual assault.

With inflation squeezing households across the country, dollar stores like Dollar Tree have been drawing in more customers than ever before. But, if you're one of many looking to stop by one of Dollar Tree's more than 9,000 locations for a bargain soon, we need to stop you right there. Believe us: We understand the appeal of its budget microwave meals, affordable snacks perfect for a grazing board, and frozen foods. But before you start filling up your cart, there are a few things you need to know about some seriously shady-sounding goings on at the chain.

Here, we take a look at some of the biggest scandals in Dollar Tree history. Some are firmly in the past, but others are far more recent than we'd like. Might we suggest a trip to Aldi instead?

In August 2020, Family Dollar employees were going about their usual daily tasks, unpacking deliveries, when they came across something pretty alarming: rodents. Yes, real, living animals inside the boxes of drugs, medical devices, cosmetics, and food. Why, we hear you ask, is this relevant to Dollar Tree? Well, it turns out, it has everything to do with the discount chain — because it actually owned Family Dollar back in 2021 (it sold the chain in 2025). It also had to pay a whopping $41 million fine to the U.S. Department of Justice over the infestation.

From 2020 to 2022, Family Dollar allowed rodent-contaminated boxes to be shipped from its West Memphis, Arkansas, warehouse to more than 400 stores. And look, in the right context, there's nothing wrong with rats and mice. These rodents get bad PR, but they play a vital role in balancing ecosystems, for example. But let's be honest: When they're in a dollar store warehouse, they're doing more harm than good.

When rodents nibble at food, they damage the packaging, leaving it open to contamination. They can also spread harmful pathogens in their droppings and urine, and can even cause structural issues by gnawing on wiring. When the Department of Justice investigated, it found nearly 1,300 rodents in the warehouse. Not only did the discount giant have to pay a $41 million fine as a consequence, but it also had to do additional reporting over the next three years.

For more than a decade, an alliance of more than 100 environmental, community, and health organizations, called the Campaign for Healthier Solutions, has been working to change the dollar store industry. The group was initially founded in 2015, after a report entitled A Day Late and a Dollar Short by Coming Clean and the Environmental Justice Health Alliance for Chemical Policy Reform found that more than 80% of household items sold at dollar stores, including Dollar Tree, contained hazardous chemicals above levels of concern.

Since then, it has released several reports on the industry, including the Toxic Chemicals in Dollar Store Products 2022 Report, which found that, of the 226 products tested from dollar store retailers like Dollar Tree, more than half, including packets of microwave popcorn and canned foods, contained chemicals of concern, like PFAS. This group of synthetic substances, known as "forever chemicals" because they don't break down in the environment, have also been found in tap water and fast food packaging. Large concentrations of them are associated with several human health risks, including fertility problems and certain types of cancer.

Fortunately, the campaign's relentless commitment to changing the industry is starting to pay off. In August 2026, for example, Dollar Tree pledged to restrict the use of harmful chemicals in several products, including PFAS in food packaging.

In July 2026, Dollar Tree was the subject of another lengthy and damning report from The Guardian. This time, it wasn't the chemicals in the hot seat, but its overall culture. The report claimed that Dollar Tree stores, with their chronic understaffing issues and chaotic, disorganized nature, were enabling the emergence of a dangerous "gooner culture." For the uninitiated, one person explained "gooner" in the r/EnglishLearning subreddit: "It's very new slang, and it means someone who masturbates a lot. Like, they've made a hobby out of it."

There have been dozens of "gooner" assaults in Dollar Tree stores since the early 2020s, claims the report. These assaults usually involve men exposing themselves, masturbating, and then ejaculating, often on their victim's clothing. On at least one occasion, the perpetrator was a Dollar Tree employee.

Many victims and lawyers believe that Dollar Tree should be doing more to crack down on these attacks. Unfortunately, despite claiming to be committed to the safety and security of its customers, the discount giant appears to have offered little real support to victims of "gooner" assaults in its stores. In one incident, it even refused to release surveillance footage of the assault to the police.

In January 2026, Dollar Tree was slapped with a $50 million wrongful death lawsuit after a woman froze to death in one of its walk-in freezers at the end of 2025. Helen Massiell Garay Sanchez, age 32, was found in a walk-in freezer by a Dollar Tree employee in Miami on December 14, 2025.

Sanchez had died of hypothermia, which occurs when a person's body temperature drops below 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Ethanol use was also listed as a contributory cause. The woman had been drinking at a nearby restaurant before wandering into the Dollar Tree with her sister on the night of December 13. At some point, she made her way to the walk-in freezer in the store's storage room, where she died.

Why the wrongful death lawsuit? Well, Sanchez's sister claims she alerted the Dollar Tree's manager shortly after she went missing, but they failed to offer appropriate support in locating her. In a statement to People in February, a Dollar Tree spokesperson claimed that they couldn't comment on the legal action, but that the company was "cooperating fully with authorities."

So far, we've looked at the many scandals where Dollar Tree appears to have failed its customers, but it seems that the company's neglectful tendencies extend to its employees, too. In 2023, Dollar Tree was fined more than $250,000 after an investigation into one of its Texas locations found several worker safety violations.

Investigators for the Department of Labor found blocked fire exits, blocked walkways, and boxes that were stacked so high they could fall on workers. Unfortunately, this was far from the first incident of this nature. From 2017 to 2023, more than 500 investigations, resulting in more than $13 million in fines, found similar hazards in Dollar Tree and Family Dollar stores.

But the issues didn't begin in 2017. There is also a record of multiple investigations into Dollar Tree stores in the early 2010s. In fact, by 2014, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) had charged them more than $800,000 in fines for failing to take worker safety seriously. In one visit, a federal investigator from OSHA actually witnessed boxes falling onto an employee.

The summer of 2026 was a PR nightmare for Dollar Tree, but it was considerably worse for the women in its stores. A month before The Guardian published its "gooner" assault investigation, a female Dollar Tree worker filed a lawsuit against her manager in New York over sexual harassment.

Nasushon Taylor's complaint, filed in June 2026, claimed that the manager had repeatedly harassed her since she started the job in January 2024. Despite Taylor's frequent rebuttals, the manager persistently pressed the front of his pants into her, asked her for her number, and asked her out on dates multiple times a week. When she started wearing a fake engagement ring to work, the manager responded by cutting Taylor's hours. She felt she had no choice but to resign in May 2024.

Due to the lawsuit, Taylor's case received widespread media attention, but a quick search on Reddit shows she isn't alone. "[Store manager] did nothing about sexual harassment," reads one thread in the r/DollarTree subreddit. "Manager keeps flirting with me," reads another. In one comment, a user claimed, "There has been a manager like this at our store since I started a couple years ago. No one has done anything about it."

In November 2023, WanaBana recalled all lots of its WanaBana Apple Cinnamon Fruit Puree Pouches, as well as Weis Cinnamon Apple Sauce and Schnucks Apple Sauce With Cinnamon, from stores across the U.S. It turns out, the applesauce pouches, marketed at babies and children, contained concerningly high levels of lead, which, if ingested, could lead to lead poisoning. At the time of the recall, four people had reported lead toxicity symptoms as a result of consuming the pouches, so it was imperative that all stores remove the pouches from sale immediately. But Dollar Tree ignored the recall.

According to an investigation by the New York Office of the Attorney General, Dollar Tree continued to sell hundreds of recalled pouches to customers. This neglect could have serious consequences; lead exposure in children is associated with issues like brain development impairment, anemia, and in rare cases, severe damage to the brain and central nervous system.

As a consequence for ignoring the recall, the New York Office of the Attorney General fined Dollar Tree nearly $560,000 in January 2026. According to New York Attorney General Letitia James, the money was dedicated to lead poisoning prevention programs and increasing access to healthy, affordable food in the state.

In June 2024, Dollar Tree was hit with yet another lawsuit. This time, because it had refused to hire a job applicant over an erroneous background check. According to Eddie Jonathan Smith, Dollar Tree went ahead and declined his application without giving him a chance to correct the report, which listed criminal convictions that he didn't have.

Dollar Tree isn't alone in dealing with this kind of lawsuit. Cases around background checks have become notably more common in recent years, as more applicants are aware of their rights under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). In fact, in 2019, one report distributed by Good Jobs First found that from 2010 to 2019, employers had paid out around $174 million to settle similar background check lawsuits.

According to Smith's lawsuit, Dollar Tree violated the FCRA, as he didn't receive notification of the background check or a statement of FCRA rights. And it gets worse: When Dollar Tree was notified of the incorrect results, it still didn't hire Smith.

Many people rely on dollar stores like Dollar Tree and Family Dollar for over-the-counter medications, believing that it's all the same thing, anyway. But while the content might be the same, it seems that storage sometimes isn't. In 2023, Dollar Tree subsidiary Family Dollar had to recall over-the-counter drugs, vitamins, and toothpaste because it had been storing hundreds of these products at incorrect temperatures.

Storing medical products at the correct temperature is essential; if they're too warm or too cold, it can affect their overall efficacy. As a result, Family Dollar recalled the products from 23 states and offered customers full refunds. Even more shocking, this wasn't even the first incident of this nature in 2023. Family Dollar was also found by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in May 2023 to be storing Advil at the wrong temperature.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).