From The Trussville Tribune staff reports
TRUSSVILLE — A man has made allegations of racism against the Hobby Lobby store located on Patrick Way in Trussville. This comes after an incident yesterday in which a Trussville police officer was called to the location to speak with Brian Spurlock, the man who made the allegations and who said that he had been discriminated against when he tried to return an item.
WVTM reported that Spurlock’s girlfriend made a post on Facebook, which said that Spurlock was trying to return an item for his girlfriend but was denied due to his ethnicity, apparently prompting employees to call the police. According to the article, when Spurlock handed over a receipt to return the item, an employee asked him to wait outside while they made calls to their corporate office to see if it was returnable.
The post alleges that the manager was calling the police under the pretense of contacting the corporate office. Shortly afterwards, Spurlock was approached by a police officer who asked to see his identification. When he produced his ID, the officer checked it and then returned it to Spurlock.
The Trussville Hobby Lobby location and Hobby Lobby media relations have not yet release any statements on the incident.
However, the Trussville Police Department later released a statement saying that an officer was called there because of concerns that Spurlock may have fit the description of someone who had made fraudulent returns to the store. According to the statement, it was later determined that Spurlock was not the man in the profile and he was allowed to leave.
Below is the statement by the police department.
“On May, 15, 2018 our dispatch office received a call from Hobby Lobby concerning someone in their store that they believed had written bad checks and made fraudulent returns to their store. Hobby Lobby was going trespass the person and wanted an officer there at the store. When our officer arrived he spoke to an employee of Hobby Lobby and they explained the situation to him. Our officer spoke to the person and asked for his Identification. The person asked why and once the officer explained it to him he gave the officer a Alabama Identification Card. The officer ran the Id and it came back expired. Hobby Lobby did have a picture of the person that was writing bad checks and making fraudulent returns and it looked somewhat like the person in the store but it did not appear to be him. The officer gave the person’s Id back to him and asked him if he had a driver’s license since he was driving and the person stated that he had a Georgia Drivers License but did not have it on his person. The officer advised him not to drive his vehicle out of the parking lot without a valid license and the person called someone to come and pick him up.”