Local Lafayette Restaurant Looking to Identify Customer Who Sexually Assaulted One of Their Servers
Serving the public is hard enough, but far too often restaurant workers have to deal with this type of harassment and assault.
Servers, bartenders, and many others in the service industry have a tough gig. While there are many perks to the job, the parts that make the job difficult at times are usually due to crappy humans.
Whether it's dealing with a customer who is impossible to please, or maybe someone who has had too much to drink, there are a variety of reoccurring scenarios that people in the service industry dread but also know to be inevitable in their line of work.
With that said, just because it's common or inevitable doesn't make it OK.
Frederick Nonato is the COO of Tsunami Sushi and over the weekend he posted a surveillance video clip from their Lafayette location. In the 12-second video, one of his servers is sexually assaulted by a male customer.
The video shows a customer in a blue shirt walking back into the main section of the restaurant from the backdoor/bathroom area. A female server is seen entering the frame and handing the man what looks like the check.
As the customer grabs the check with his left hand, he almost simultaneously brings his right hand to the backside of the female server.
After tapping her on the backside a few quick times the customer is seen forcefully grabbing her on the buttocks, getting one big squeeze in before walking away. The server is clearly startled by this as you can see from her reaction.
As the female server stands there shocked, the customer points back at her as he walks away.
She walks forward, then abruptly stops, before turning around and walking back to the hall area.
If there was one moment in the video that really made me angry other than the obvious sexual assault, it was that last frame just after the server was just violated. She froze in the moment, and instead of making a scene in the very public dining area of her restaurant, she took on the burden of keeping her calm and alerting management in private.
This is something that I can guarantee you the majority of service industry workers will do to "keep the peace" and not disrupt other customers. Sometimes, these workers have to also deal with management who won't take their side or have their back in situations like this due to a "customer is always right" mentality or to not further affect business.
Luckily, Frederick and the rest of the management at Tsunami look out for their employees and have a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to people who mistreat their staff, especially like this.
If, by chance, you recognize the man in this video, notify management at Tsunami and they will handle the situation accordingly.
This type of behavior is unacceptable and should not be tolerated—for people working in the service industry and any other human being on earth for that matter.
Hats off to Tsunami Sushi for always looking out for their own and doing the right thing.