Police in the Atlanta suburb of Union City are searching for an unidentified man accused of throwing bleach in the face of a stunned teenage employee of Burger King who was working the night shift on Jonesboro Road.
Seventeen-year-old Andrea Alexander didn’t notice anything unusual when she greeted the customer at the drive-thru window just before 10 p.m. on Sept. 10. Their brief exchange seemed amicable, with no hints of the ambush to come.
After placing his order, the man rolled up to the window to pay, and Alexander was ready to hand him his food. Instead, he doused the teen with bleach in a shocking, unprovoked assault.
“When I looked back up, he threw a cup of bleach in my face. Then I closed my eyes and heard him driving off,” she told Atlanta News First, adding that he drove a red Chevy pickup truck but couldn’t remember much else.
“At first, I thought it was water because it was really cold,” she in an interview with local station Fox 5. She quickly realized it was something much more sinister: “But then I took a breath, and the bleach got in my mouth and my eyes, and my eyes started burning.”
Alexander was unable to open her eyes after the attack, yet management allegedly did not provide first aid or call 911 to notify the police.
“I was really scared; I was screaming and crying and trying to rinse my face out ’cause I just didn’t know what to do,” she explained.
Her mother, LaToya Alexander, was disturbed by Burger King’s alleged lack of response to the attack and got restaurant management on the phone later that night after calling the police.
“Whatever their procedure is when some type of emergency like that happens, nothing was followed,” she told reporters.
LaToya was informed by Burger King that the incident was caught on surveillance cameras. The footage has since been provided to the police.
“While we were on the phone, she (management) was describing what she saw in the video, like, she confirmed the time. She said she saw the truck, you know, she could see what was going on in the video,” LaToya stated.
Though bleach can cause chemical burns to the eyes and corneal abrasions, Alexander didn’t sustain any serious injuries. However, the teen is understandably traumatized and too frightened to return to work.
“The first night, it was hard for me to sleep. I haven’t really got any sleep just because every time I open my eyes, I see somebody throwing bleach in my face,” she lamented to ANF.
It’s unclear if this was a single incident or a pattern of assault on drive-thru workers, but Alexander is warning fellow fast-food employees to be careful and contact police if something similar happens to them.
“I hope that if this has happened to anyone else, they reach out. If they have information, reach out so I can get justice,” she urged.
Union City Police Captain Prentice Brooks told Fox 5, “We’re looking at some surveillance. Hopefully, get some more information to locate the perpetrator and get some justice for the young lady.”
“It’s just very traumatizing,” said Alexander. “I don’t want to be left alone. It’s hard.”
