A recent incident at the McDonald's drive-thru in Detroit has been the talk of the town after a video of what happened was uploaded online by local rapper Ehbate Skeez.
In the video, a crew member manning the drive-thru was shown calling for the old homeless man who was later identified as Willie Payne Jr.
The crew shouted and said, "Hey Willie, come here! You want a sandwich?" Payne did not respond at once so the man called again and tried to lure him to come by saying, "Come on, let me give you a sandwich, man."
However, when the man finally approached the window, instead of handing him the sandwich, the crew member suddenly hurled water to his face. Visibly shocked at the act, Willie could only say, "Oh, why you do that?" Then he walked away in the rain.
On the other hand, the person in the car who was filming the whole scenario, rather than doing something, was heard laughing.
The next day, Skeez posted the video on his Facebook page. It was first uploaded on Nov. 6, and now it's going viral. He captioned his video with: "Worrrlllldddstar this what happens to panhandlers at McDonald's. I feel bad for laughing but that s- was funny."
The scenes on the video drew the ire of people around the world and got the attention of local officials. Most condemned the inhumane act of the young crew member and took pity on Willie. Many people posted their own insight about the incident through various social media.
Apparently, the video also reached the owner of McDonald's Grand River branch and he immediately fired the crew member involved. Wise Finley confirmed to WXYZ, that the erring staff has been terminated.
"I am very disturbed by the inappropriate behavior of this employee. This type of behavior is not tolerated in my organization. I expect my employees to treat everyone with dignity and respect, and this was unacceptable. This individual no longer works for my organization," Finley said.
Detroit Free Press also published in the news that Tasha Gray, the executive director of the Homeless Action Network of Detroit, was enraged after viewing the video.
"I think we forget sometimes that people experiencing homelessness are just like you and I," she said. "We have working families who just don't have enough means to make ends meet. I like to tell my staff that we're one missed paycheck away from homelessness."
Bishop Daryl Harris, a pastor of Total Life Christian Ministries and a member of Detroit's Human Rights Commission, also aired out his sentiments saying, "I was outraged - I couldn't believe it. He use the food that he was asking for to lure him over and assault him in that manner, it was just cruel."
The officials also attempted to find the old man in the video so they can help him. It was revealed on WXYZ that he was finally located, and when asked for comments, he simply said, "I just walked away. Just made me a little upset and everything. You know, I barely have a little change to buy the things that I need. And (I was) thinking he was going to give me something, but he didn't."
And does he have any message to the crew member who threw water to his face? "How would you feel if someone did that to you or anyone else?" Payne said.
