A Mississippi police officer is being called out after taking an aggressive approach to finding out why a group of Black women was kicked out of a restaurant.
Tiffany Wilson and her friends were going to celebrate her mother’s birthday at Sippin Silo Wine Bar in Southaven, Mississippi, on Saturday.
“What should have been a simple visit to a local establishment to celebrate my mother’s birthday became one of the most RACIST, humiliating and unacceptable customer service experiences I have encountered,” Wilson said on Facebook.
A Seating Issue
According to the business, the party tried to reserve a table for a party of 10 on Friday. But Sippin Silo said it could not accommodate a party of that size.
The restaurant says that when the party arrived on Saturday, they requested a table for 10 again. But after they were denied, the women agreed that they would just need a table for six.
The restaurant accused the group of having additional people arrive after they were seated. But when they decided the space wouldn’t work, they left.
Wilson said they went to the restaurant around 4 p.m., when the restaurant was empty. She clarified that the group consisted of eight people and that they never tried to make a reservation.
“Majority of us are family, all highly educated, professional, well-spoken Black women,” Wilson said.
The restaurant accused some of the women of coming back and yelling at the staff.
“They were talking at the host stand, which then became cursing towards our staff, and the group was asked to leave,” the restaurant said.
That’s when they called police.
“We want to be clear that the decision regarding seating and the subsequent decision to contact law enforcement were not based on the race of the guests involved,” the restaurant said.
An Aggressive Encounter
A Southaven police officer approached the women outside the restaurant minutes later.
Wilson identified him as Ryan Kornrumpf. Atlanta Black Star also confirmed the officer’s identity through the department’s website.
“I was told you were cussing and causing a commotion in the restaurant,” he told the three women in a video taken by a Black bystander.
“We did not do that inside there,” one of the women said.
Two of the women told Kornrumpf that they work for the Memphis Police Department and tried to calmly explain the situation.
At one point in the video, seemingly fed up with the women, Kornrumpf got closer to one of the women after he asked for her driver’s license.
“I’m going to give orders now, and you’re going to listen,” he said aggressively as he demanded their IDs.
“I finna gone get my ID, but you don’t have to walk up on me like that,” one of the women told him.
A Lifetime Ban
Soon after, a female officer arrived on the scene. She gave the women the opportunity to tell their side of the story. But as she listened, Kornrumpf tried to explain his actions as he took the women’s driver’s licenses.
“If you don’t obey law enforcement, then things will escalate,” Kornrumpf argued. He added that he was doing the woman “a favor by not putting her in handcuffs.”
The officer explained that he had to be involved because he was the “primary officer for the investigation”
“The only reason you stepped down is that these people walked up,” the woman recording the video told him. “It’s on video!”
Once they explained their side of the story, Kornrumpf gave the women their IDs back. As he handed them out, he told each woman they were banned from the business.
“I would never come back here. There’s terrible service here anyway,” one of the women told him as he handed her license.
The women waited for a lieutenant to speak to, but there was allegedly not one working at the time. Kornrumpf was hovering as the women told his supervisor about his actions.
Online Reaction
As the video gained more attention online, some people who knew Kornrumpf began speaking out. His ex-wife, Jenny Downs, accused him of getting fired from a different police department for harassment.
“This is my f—king ex-husband that needs mental help bad. He has a temper from hell. He acts like a child when he doesn’t get his way,” Downs wrote online. “He’s only 33 years old. He got fired from Olive Branch PD for harassment.”
At the end of the day, Wilson said what really bothered her was being racially profiled.
“As a Black customer, I cannot separate the way this situation was handled from the very real concern that we were racially profiled,” Wilson wrote on Facebook.
“I know how I was spoken to. I know how quickly our questions were treated as a problem rather than a customer service matter. And I know how deeply disturbing it was to watch an ordinary interaction escalate to police involvement.”
Atlanta Black Star reached out to the police department, restaurant, and women about the situation, but has not heard back.
