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A trans woman says she was forced to close her café in Val David last month after it was repeatedly vandalized and amid a barrage of online reviews deriding her gender identity and political views.

The trouble started almost immediately after she opened her vegan café last spring; people smashed bottles outside the building and left dead animals at its doorstep, Sophia Banks says.

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“At first I thought it was maybe some local kids, but the vandalism was just so persistent,” Banks told the Montreal Gazette. “And there were all these negative reviews — that were clearly fake — and the transphobic messages, it just kept happening. … Eventually, it just became so stressful, I felt so singled out.

“Because the vandalism kept happening and the online stuff was just so non-stop, I didn’t feel safe anymore, I didn’t feel like my staff was safe anymore. I was losing money, I was going into work and having a panic attack every week. So we decided to close the business.”