*(Los Angeles, CA) As reported by ABC Channel 7 Denver an African-American man by the name of Shawn Bauck went into Cousin Pat’s Pub & Grill in Estes Park for food and drink, but instead received a heaping portion of Jim Crow.
The environmental science major was told by the Trump-supporting waitress that although he seemed “educated” and “different” that the majority of black people were “thugs, wife beaters and gangsters.” Amidst the recent killing of 23 year old Elijah McClain who died in police custody, the server sympathized with the police and justified racism on the basis of daily encounters with the black community.
Even more alarming, the waitress felt comfortable using the “n” word in front of Bauck and his girlfriend. When Mr. Bauck took the appropriate measure of lodging a formal complaint with the owner in the restaurant for the use of derogatory language; the owner smirked and did nothing. The owner (Patrick Beard) simply replied “well in what context was it used?”
“The law, if not our history, does not allow a restaurant owner to do nothing when a black person informs him of racial slurs being used by employees in the establishment,” says Mr. Bauck’s attorney, Jason Flores-Williams. “The image of a person of color leaving a restaurant with their heads down, and without due process, is a fixture of our history that we should no longer be willing to accept in any form.”
