Texas woman throws spicy soup at restaurant employee; viral video

Tribune Web Desk
Chandigarh, November 12

A woman in Texas is facing criminal charges after a video of her throwing a bowl of spicy soup at a restaurant worker went viral, the Independent reported.

A time stamp on the viral video says November 7.

The Independent said in its news report that NBC-affiliated news channel KCEN-TV did not identify the woman, but said she’d placed a call to Sol De Jalisco on November 7 in Temple, Texas, to complain about a soup ordered she’d picked up from there minutes ago.

Jannelle Broland, the restaurant employee with whom the woman got into an argument over the phone and later threw the soup at, said the woman had complained that the soup was so hat that the packaging lid had melted. Borloand, who made one of two Tik Tok videos of the incident, said she’d apologised to the woman over the phone and offered to refund the money, but the woman continued to abuse her and later stormed into the restaurant, the Independent reported. 

The Independent quoted Broland as telling the woman she would help the woman if she stopped abusing but consistent efforts to placate her didn’t work.

A video of the incident shows a woman arguing with a restaurant employee, suddenly throw the contents of a takeaway plastic cup across the restaurant’s cash counter at Broland’s face and quickly leave the restaurant as someone tries to pursue her.

“My eyes were burning, my nose was bleeding, I was in a lot of pain. By the time I wiped it away and could almost see again, there were already customers and staff outside following her out,” she said in a second TikTok video.

Police said no one has been injured in the incident and that the soup had by then cooled enough to not hurt Broland.

“The spices from it are what hit me the most. I remember feeling the warmth of the soup, but my eyes burned so bad. My nose was burning. It kind of kind of took my breath away for a second because just the burning... I was really in shock from it all,” she said.

Charges against the unidentified woman are pending, the Independent said. She has been banned from the restaurant.

On Wednesday, the restaurant issued a statement condemning the woman’s actions.

 “The Marquez family does not tolerate such behaviour, and we simply want our establishment to be a place where people can chill out and enjoy live music, delicious Mexican food, and the best local drinks — as we have stated on our social media accounts continuously,” Sol De Jalisco said in a Facebook post.

The Independent reported the police as saying that the woman had left the premises before officers arrived. Broland said in her video that other customers at the restaurant helped her clean up and followed the woman outside the restaurant. She said the customers recorded the woman’s car license plate number in the second TikTok video, the Independent said in its report.

Allen Teston, the deputy chief of Temple police, said in a statement that this kind of behaviour was not condoned, the Independent reported.

“If a citizen believes they have received poor service, we advise them to remain civil until the problem is resolved,” he said.