Starbucks Again Apologizes For Treatment Of Police, This Time After Two Cops In California Refused Service
Starbucks has apologized after two police officers in California were refused service, ABC News reports. It’s the latest in a string of incidents in which the company has been accused of mistreating law enforcement officers.
The event took place at a location in Riverside on Thursday night, although what happened specifically remains unclear, according to Palm Springs’ KESQ-TV. It seems, based on tweets from those connected to the incident, that two Riverside County Sheriff’s deputies were simply ignored for several minutes while they were inside.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco tweeted late Friday that two of his officers were refused service, adding that “the anti police culture repeatedly displayed by Starbucks employees must end.”
However, there may be more to the story, or less to the story, based on responses from Starbucks and from the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office (RSO) Twitter account.
In response to Bianco’s tweet, whomever manages the RSO account further appeared to claim that one of the officers was given a cup with no coffee, presumably as a prank or insult.
“We are aware of the ‘cop with no coffee’ incident that occurred in Riverside on 12/12/19, involving our @RSO deputies,” the tweet read.
A Starbucks spokesperson, however, suggested in a response that the officers weren’t necessarily being ignored, but rather, the employees weren’t being very good at their jobs that night and were being inattentive.
Still, Starbucks spokesperson Reggie Borges apologized.
“There is simply no excuse for how two Riverside deputies were ignored for nearly 5 minutes at our store on Thursday evening. We are deeply sorry and reached out to apologize directly to them,” he said.
Borges went on to note that this type of behavior is not acceptable for any customer, in uniform or not. He also noted that the employees who were on the clock that night are off-duty until further notice, while the incident is being investigated, and the company is working to ensure that such a thing won’t happen again.
This marks the latest incident in which police have reportedly been mistreated at Starbucks.
As previously reported by The Inquisitr, a couple of weeks ago, an Oklahoma law enforcement officer went into a Starbucks in Glenpool to order drinks for colleagues. An employee wrote the word “pig” on the cups, and was fired.
Similarly, earlier this summer, as The Phoenix New Times reported at the time, several uniformed police officers were asked to leave a Tempe, Arizona location.
