The incident occurred at Starbucks on Spruce Street near South 18th Street, Philadephia.
Starbuck's CEO, Kevin Johnson released a statement apologizing on behalf of the company and hopes to meet with the two men to "offer a face-to-face apology."
"The video shot by customers is very hard to watch and the actions in it are not representative of our Starbucks mission and values. Creating an environment that is both safe and welcoming for everyone is paramount for every store. Regretfully, our practices and training led to a bad outcome -- the basis for the call to the Philadelphia police department was wrong. Our store manager never intended for these men to be arrested and this should never have escalated as it did." Johnson said.50-year-old Melissa DePino, who captured it on video said Starbucks manager shouted from behind the counter at the two black men to buy or leave.
"They were sitting quietly minding their own business, and waiting for their friend to come."DePino who appeared appalled by the stereotypic incident vows not to visit Starbucks anymore.
"Plenty of other local places to go."Philadelphia, nicknamed City of Brotherly Love...
Mayor Jim Kenney tweeted:
"I’m very concerned by the incident at Starbucks. I know Starbucks is reviewing it and we will be too. @PhillyPolice is conducting an internal investigation."The mayor put out another statement saying he was "heartbroken" to witness what "appears to exemplify what racial discrimination looks like in 2018."
"For many, Starbucks is not just a place to buy a cup of coffee, but a place to meet up with friends or family members, or to get some work done."Philadelphia Police Commissioner Richard Ross Jr. posted a detailed account of the incident, in which he defended his officers' actions.
He assured the public that he has gone over the facts and limped to the cops' defense, saying they "did absolutely nothing wrong."
"I can tell you candidly these officers did a service they were called to do.""They didn't do anything, I saw the entire thing, what did they do wrong?" said one white man, who questioned the arresting officers.
Clearly outraged, DePino took to twitter to vent her anger at saying it was racially unjust.
"All the other white ppl are wondering why it’s never happened to us when we do the same thing."Starbucks initially responded on Twitter:
"We apologize to the two individuals and our customers for what took place at our Philadelphia store on Thursday."Johnson, the CEO, said the company will begin to take a look at its policies to for necessary updates on treating customers.
"We have immediately begun a thorough investigation of our practices. In addition to our own review, we will work with outside experts and community leaders to understand and adopt best practices."
"We also will further train our partners to better know when police assistance is warranted. Additionally, we will host a company-wide meeting next week to share our learnings, discuss some immediate next steps and underscore our long-standing commitment to treating one another with respect and dignity."The employees allegedly told the two men they were not permitted to use the restroom since they weren't paying customers.
Ross said in the video posted on the department's Facebook page:
"And so they asked the two males to leave and they refused to leave and the police were called."
According to Ross's retelling of the police officers' account of the incident:
"Go ahead and call the police. We don't care."One of them allegedly took a verbal jab at the cops saying, "You don't actually know what you're doing. You're only a $45,000 a year employee." Ross said in the video.
Ross said the men were given several chances to leave, but they kept refusing.Starbucks Witness: Implicit Bias Exists and White People Need to Speak Up When They See It https://t.co/E9wJYwlKqB via @TheRoot— Melissa DePino (@missydepino) April 15, 2018
"On three different occasions the officers asked the two males politely to leave the location because they were being asked to leave by employees because they were trespassing. Instead the males continued to refuse as they had told the employees and they told the officers they were not leaving."Ross said that the police remained professional and they "followed policy and they did what they are supposed to do."
The commissioner
He said that he has made it a priority for his department -- both rank and file as well as commanders -- to receive racially sensitive training that includes taking field trips to the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.
"We do this because we want people, our officers, our recruits to understand the minute they come on board to know about the atrocities that were committed by policing around the world."Sometimes fear of police officers protesting can make these commissioners speak in favor of them... You can't give your officers pass for wrongly handling a situation - reprimand them it'll make them understand their role better!!
We regret that our practices and training led to the reprehensible outcome at our Philadelphia store. We’re taking immediate action to learn from this and be better. A statement from ceo Kevin Johnson: https://t.co/kPav8bEeOX— Starbucks Coffee (@Starbucks) April 15, 2018
I’m very concerned by the incident at Starbucks. I know Starbucks is reviewing it and we will be too. @PhillyPolice is conducting an internal investigation. https://t.co/fp0NjwiO2L— Jim Kenney (@PhillyMayor) April 14, 2018
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