Reports: Man beaten inside Denny’s after standing up for restaurant staff
A man was badly beaten inside a Denny’s in Fremont early morning Sunday after he said he told a belligerent food delivery service driver to calm down, reports said.
Frederick Ibonie told KTVU that he was waiting for his food inside the Denny’s at 5280 Mowry Ave. around 2:30 a.m. after getting off of work.
A man Ibonie thinks was working for DoorDash came in and started being “incredibly rude” and verbally aggressive to the restaurant staff over an order that wasn’t yet ready for pickup.
Police in #Fremont investigating alleged overnight attack- Victim says he was at Denny’s when he saw man- he claims works for DoorDash being verbally abusive to employees upset his order wasn’t ready. Victim speaks up, gets beaten up. #ktvu 10/11p pic.twitter.com/HQ8Q4RJ6BJ
— Azenith Smith (@AzenithKTVU) April 1, 2019
“This DoorDasher came in and was like, really angry that they weren’t just taking care of him straight away,” Ibonie said in an interview with KTVU. “He was causing a scene in the middle of lobby area.”
Ibonie, who said he’s a waiter at the nearby Smoking Pig BBQ, told the man, “Dude, calm down, they’ll get to you when they can.”
Another customer reportedly said something also, and that’s when the man allegedly punched Ibonie in the face multiple times, knocking out some of his teeth, and badly injuring him. His mother took him to Washington Hospital for treatment.
“I never raised my hands, I never said a threatening word to him,” Ibonie said. He said he doesn’t have health insurance, and is worried about how he’ll pay for the medical care he needs.
Fremont police are investigating, and told ABC7 News Sunday night they weren’t ready to say for sure if the man accused of beating Ibonie is indeed a DoorDash driver. Police said they would be looking for more evidence on Monday.
Frederick Ibonie is missing 3 teeth, has a fractured nose/palate and 10 stitches in his lip.
He says a DoorDash employee attacked him at this Denny’s in Fremont. He says the man was berating Denny’s servers for not having an order ready. Ibonie told him to stop and got punched. pic.twitter.com/wd43A1IRTg— Kate Larsen (@KateABC7) April 1, 2019
ABC7 News reported Ibonie is missing 3 teeth, has a fractured nose and palate, and 10 stitches in his lip.
DoorDash issued a statement to the news stations Sunday in response to inquiries about the incident.
“At DoorDash, we take the safety of our community extremely seriously. We are investigating the alleged incident and will take action as appropriate, including deactivating the Dasher from our platform.”