White Maryland Man Recorded Calling Police On Black Women For Drinking Wine By Pool Blames Autism
Over the weekend, two different groups of Black women in Maryland decided to escape the heat by hanging out at an apartment complex pool while sipping wine.
While the women were enjoying their Saturday, a white man identified as Nick Starr-Street decided to report the women for using glassware by the pool, which broke an alleged rule of the Edition Apartments on East-West Highway in Hyattsville.
Starr-Street called the leasing office and the police on the women, which prompted them to take out their phone and record the racist incident, reported WUSA9.
It all began on June 22 when Felecia Soso tweeted she and her friends were by the pool when a man complaining about glass bottles confronted them. In a video posted to Soso's Twitter account, Starr-Street can be seen recording one of the women and telling her "glassware is not allowed at the pool."
When the woman in the video said she would get rid of the glass and asked Starr-Street, "What else do I need to do for you to be comfortable?" he responded, "I'm going to report you to the leasing office."
After someone from the leasing office came and spoke to the women, Starr-Street called the police. Once officers with the Hyattsville Police Department arrived, the women gave their side of the story and decided to leave the pool without incident.
The next day, Gaëlle Claude posted a different video on Twitter that showed Starr-Street following her and a friend while he called 911.
"This white man literally stalked us from his apartment for damn near a mile just cause we were at the pool drinking wine and taking pictures. Called the police and all...I cannot make this up,” she wrote.
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Starr-Street posted a video to his own YouTube page that shows him confronting the women about having glass by the pool. He then followed the women as they left the pool and walked to an unidentified business.
According to the Hyattsville Police Department, "the women alleged the man had then followed them from the apartment building to a business. The man stated he followed them because one of them had slapped his phone from his hand during the initial argument."
Officers could not verify a crime occurred and called the alleged infractions isolated and misdemeanors, according to a statement on the police department’s Facebook page.
Once the videos went viral, Starr-Street spoke with WUSA9 and defended his actions by blaming his alleged autism.
"I'm autistic. I just see right and wrong," Starr-Street explained. "I don't see race. I don't see gender. I don’t see color. I don't see any of that."
Although he said race is not a factor, Starr-Street did admit he called security on a group of white women at the pool on Monday, but never recorded them or called 911.
"I think because of the way that my mind works, I don't always click with other people," Starr-Street told WUSA9. "I don't understand when people get upset over the things that I say or do. To me, that’s just how I feel."
