After three women call a Grosse Pointe Farms restaurant racist for asking them to leave, there was a protest outside Blufin Sushi.
Protestors marched for about two hours outside of the closed sushi restaurant off Mack Ave on Wednesday night. The restaurant did not open Wednesday because of the protest.
The women claim they were asked to move and then leave, when they were the only African Americans at the bar. The incident happened on Saturday, and went viral when one of the women used Facebook to live stream their departure.
"We were the only African Americans at the bar and that's what we've been saying from the very beginning, I couldn't possibly have known who was in that restaurant at that time,” sad Adrienne Savage, one of the women at Blufin on Saturday.
The restaurant’s attorney, Dave Draper, said there were other African Americans in the restaurant.
"Of the 60 people in the restaurant that night, 4 other groups, besides these ladies, four other groups were African American, they were not asked to leave, they were mid meal, mid drink, what have you,” said Draper.
That’s exactly what the women claim.
"The issue is why would we get up when we were in the middle of our service and asked to make room for other customers,” said Savage.
The attorney said the women only had waters at that point, it does appear to show that on surveillance, but it also appears to show one woman pushing an empty drink towards the bartender.
"They were asked to move within the bar to a place where they could have a cocktail, continue to drink, but we needed to open up space where people could eat,” said Draper.
The women said there was no time limit at the bar and they felt like their request was unwarranted.
"We were racially discriminated against, we were not finished with our meal,” said Savage.
Draper said there were also accusations of an assault, but the women never said anyone was assaulted, so both parties are in agreement about what’s on the surveillance video, since there is no assault.
