Starbucks is once again being slammed for being rude to police officers
Sheriff says 'The anti-police culture repeatedly displayed by Starbucks employees must end.’
Starbucks is apologizing to two sheriff’s deputies in Riverside County, California for totally ignoring the officers as they waited to be served.
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Starbucks once again is being accused of mistreating police.
Starbucks is apologizing to two sheriff’s deputies in Riverside County, California for totally ignoring the officers as they waited to be served. The incident marks the third time in six months that law enforcement has said that the Seattle-based chain snubbed them, according to The USA Today.
READ MORE: Starbucks apologizes after Arizona cops were asked to leave shop for making customer feel ‘unsafe’
Sheriff Chad Bianco drew attention to the latest incident Friday when he tweeted that “Two of our deputies were refused service at Starbucks. The anti-police culture repeatedly displayed by Starbucks employees must end.’’
Two of our deputies were refused service at Starbucks. The anti police culture repeatedly displayed by Starbucks employees must end. https://t.co/XXgjtJ9GcH
— Chad Bianco (@SheriffBianco) December 14, 2019
Bianco also posted a video on Facebook saying the two deputies were laughed at and “were completely ignored because they were in uniform. Quite honestly, that’s just not acceptable. It can’t be acceptable.’’
Reggie Borges, Starbucks spokesman, said the “disrespect” is unacceptable.
“We’re deeply sorry and we have reached out to the sheriff to apologize, and we’re hoping we can connect with the deputies directly and apologize as well,” Borges told USA Today. “We’re taking full responsibility for any intentional or unintentional disrespect shown to law enforcement, on whom we depend on every single day.”
“No one, whether you’re in uniform or not, should have to experience what these two deputies went through in our store, and we’ll take the steps necessary to address it,’’ Borges added.
The company is temporarily not scheduling the employees in question to work until a full investigation is complete, Borges told USA Today.
This latest incident is the third time Starbucks has disrespected police. Last month, an ex-worker from a Starbucks in Kiefer, Oklahoma, allegedly gave an officer a cup with the word “PIG” written on it, according to USA Today. The police chief took to social media after the incident, prompting the store to apologize and the worker who wrote the message was fired. Additionally, Starbucks said it planned to host a “Coffee with a Cop” event.
Over the summer, a Starbucks barista in Tempe, Arizona, told six police officers to move to a different spot after a customer said seeing them made him nervous. In that incident, the local police union said in a social media post, “Unfortunately, such treatment has become all too common in 2019,” according to USA Today.
READ MORE: Starbucks regional manager files lawsuit claiming racial discrimination
Starbucks’s Rossann Williams, executive vice president and president of U.S. retail, apologized for that incident: “They should have been welcomed and treated with dignity and the utmost respect by our partners (employees). Instead, they were made to feel unwelcome and disrespected, which is completely unacceptable.”
