Viral video shows McDonald's employees kicking out teens allegedly threatened by gunman

McDonald’s employees kicked out a group of teens who were allegedly threatened by a gunman in the restaurant, and the chain is under scrutiny for risking their safety.

On Monday, Farida Osman, 16, posted of a video of the events that transpired inside a McDonald’s in Eden Prairie, Wis. “McDonald’s, is this what you stand for?,” she asked in a tweet accompanying the video.

In the 45-second clip, a group of teens — Farida Osman, Jihan Abdullahi, Amal Mohammed and Zainab Hassan — confront a man who stands by the door. “He has a gun!” one of the teens yells. An employee orders, “Everyone out” while another staffer yells, “I want everyone out of my store now!” When a teen informs her that the man has a gun, she yells, “I don’t give a f***. Now, get out of my store now.”

A customer tried to intervene by telling the woman, “Hey, don’t send them out there when a dude just pulled a f***ing gun on them” and tells her to call the police, but the employee walks away.

According to the Eden Prairie News, whoever called 911 told the dispatcher that “a large group of people was causing a disturbance” and that a person brandished a gun on his way out of the restaurant.

That evening, Osman posted a second video and again took issue with the response of the McDonald’s employee. In that clip, the teens argue with the first employee, who denies justifying the gunman’s actions. “I never said I’m blaming — I said he pulled it out for a reason,” says the employee.

A third video posted by Osman shows the man yelling, “Shut up! Don’t touch me!” at the teens.

People tweeted that the employees sided with the “racist” gunman — who is white, while the teens are black Muslims — and that ordering the kids onto the street with the man who allegedly threatened them showed zero regard for their safety.

Paul Ostergaard, the owner and operator of the Eden Prairie McDonald’s, told Yahoo Lifestyle in an email, “Nothing is more important than the safety and security of our customers and employees. We take this matter seriously and are working with local law enforcement while we investigate the situation.”

A spokesperson at the Eden Prairie Police Department did not return Yahoo Lifestyle’s request for comment. According to a report in the Minneapolis-based Star Tribune, a city official said, “Officers obtained video evidence and witness statements from the scene, and police are investigating the circumstances surrounding the incident to determine if a crime was committed.”

On Tuesday, Osman told the Muslim Girl website, “Basically my friends and I were studying at the library down the street when we decided to go to McDonald’s because we were hungry.” The teens were figuring out how to use Apple Pay when the man suggested that the group was paying with welfare benefits. “Jihan heard the man say, ‘You’re probably using EBT’, and she immediately turned to him and said, “Just because I’m Black, doesn’t mean I use EBT,'” said Osman.

Osman alleged the man began swearing at them and got close enough to imply he was a physical threat. “Amin and his friends came over and that’s when…the man pulls out the gun,” she told Muslim Girl.

The gunman freely left the store, reports Muslim Girl. Osman, Abdullahi, Mohammed and Hassan did not return Yahoo Lifestyle’s requests for comment.

Read more from Yahoo Lifestyle:

• Dunkin’ Donuts apologizes for calling police on customer after she spoke Somali

• ‘Gas Station Gail’: Store manager calls police on parents and children buying drinks: ‘It’s like a riot out here’

• ‘Babysitting while black’: Woman calls police on male babysitter with white children

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