The owner of a vintage clothing store called police on a black customer who asked why he was selling a vest with a Confederate flag on it.
Nathaniel Dennis and some friends stopped by Beatnix on Halsted -- which sells costumes, wigs and various flags -- in Chicago's Boystown neighborhood, where he spotted a leather vest with a Confederate battle flag imprint, reported Yahoo Finance.
Dennis and his friend Dan Shade, who's also black, asked an employee why the boutique was selling the vest, along with flags celebrating LGBT rights.
“He basically said, ‘Well, we sell vintage items, I don’t tell anyone what to believe,’" Dennis told the website, "and sent us to the owner.”
Owner Keith Bucceri agreed the vest wasn't appropriate to sell on the main floor and tossed it behind the counter, and then started talking about Jussie Smollett, the former "Empire" actor who claimed he was the victim of a racist assault in the city.
“He said, ‘You shouldn’t be making up things that aren’t true like Jussie Smollett,” Dennis said. “I told him, ‘Why should we be subjected to symbols like this? As a black person, I am offended.’”
That's when the store owner got angry, Dennis said.
“He was so combative, saying, ‘Get it through your thick f*cking skull, it’s not racist,’” Dennis said. “He said we were trespassing and to ‘get the f*ck out’ or he would call the police.”
An employee picked up the phone, so Dennis and his friends left, fearing they could end up victims of police violence, although Shade went back and photographed the vest without incident.
The store owner declined to comment, but posted an explanation of the incident on Facebook.
“We do not sell that type of merchandise normally, it was not a shirt, it was a leather vest and wasn't being sold to support any such ideas," the post reads. "It was taken off the floor and the customer didn't want to stop going on about it and when he wouldn't stop … was asked to leave and yes the police were called and when they came they said they could arrest him for criminal trespassing....and I said that would not be necessary....if you choose not to come to Beatnix that is your choice, but based on this sloppy person’s very poor listening skills and insistence on arguing a point unnecessarily since the item in question was taken off the floor..it seems irrational.”
