Ukiah Swain is the mother of four teenage boys who were harassed by a manager at a Kroger grocery store in Mesquite, Texas, last week. Swain told Dallas Fort Worth’s station KXAS NBC 5 that the manager at that store called the police on her teenage sons after they purchased snacks at the store. Why did he call them? For shoplifting. Why did the manager single out these black male teens? According to 16-year-old Zavarion Swain, the manager told him, "We've had problems with people like you before."
When the police arrived, the teens produced the receipts for their purchases, freshly printed, but still received a trespassing warning. This means that for one year, any one of these kids can be arrested at the discretion of either the manager or the police if they step foot inside of that Kroger.
Ms. Swain confronted the manager, who laughed and told her that he thought they looked like they could be shoplifters. After video of the aftermath was posted to Facebook, local news picked up the story, and Kroger has quickly gone into damage control mode, promising “sensitivity training” to all staff in Kroger stores in northern Texas and saying that it has “rescinded” the complaint against the kids: "We recognize these steps alone won’t change the broader systemic and cultural biases that plague our society, but we believe that together they demonstrate the seriousness with which we take these issues and our desire to be a part of the solution, Kroger said in a statement.
In the aftermath video you can see the police filling out the complaint, and the manager trying to hide his face from the cellphone video being shot by Ms. Swain, who calls him out for his illogical bigotry in the amazing moment when he must come out and sign the racist complaint he’s made.
Swain: You gotta come out here and sign it.
[Police officers confirm that they cannot finish the process until the manager comes out and signs it.]
You see, he doesn’t want to.
When the manager finally comes out to sign the complaint, he holds his hand in front of his face.
Swain: He took his name tag off and everything. Y’all get a good look at him. Get a good look at him.
The manager then changes tack and acts indignant, possibly saying something like “I’m not racist,” though it is hard to understand.
Swain: Oh, he’s mad now.
Manager: Of course I’m mad. I don’t like being called names myself.
Swain: You called the police on some young little black boys who came to buy snacks. You waited until they bought their snacks. That was real, real nice of you. Criminal trespass, because they can’t come back to the store to buy snacks. You’d rather lose customers than apologize for your mistake.
Exactly. Listen, you profiled some black kids because you have a lot of fear and racism baked into your psyche. Fine. But these kids didn’t shoplift, and you fucked up. Own it. If you can’t own it, you don’t get any chance at making things right. Unless, of course, you do want to treat black people, and in particular black children, cruelly and unfairly. If that’s the case, then fuck you. I hope you get fired.
You can watch the aftermath below, which includes the very guilty manager trying to hide in his office around the 6:40 mark.