Scott Naff is an officer with the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. Last Thursday a McDonald’s employee refused to serve him food he had already paid for after seeing him in his police uniform. The account of what happened comes from the officer’s wife who wrote about it on her Facebook account:

My husband just got home from working a 13 hour day to share a story with me that has left me completely shocked. Around 7:00 tonight he took a small break and went to the drive through of the Mcdonald’s at Parham Road and Route 1. He was in uniform and his police vehicle. He paid for his food and drove forward to the next window. The young man who was working that window looked at him and backed away from the window mouthing something to my husband. My husband couldn’t hear him since the window was closed. The guy finally walked to the window and slid it open. My husband told him that he couldn’t hear him and the guy said “I ain’t serving no police” and closed the window. The guy proceeded to tell everyone in McDonald’s, including the manager, that he was not going to serve the police. The employees stared at my husband trying to figure out what they should do…..after all he had paid for his food but no one wanted to give it to him. Finally one guy brought it over to him without a single word. As my husband pulled around the building, a gentleman who was in the McDonalds at the time approached his car and told my husband how he had never seen anything like this. He said the guy had told the manager that she could fire him but he wasn’t going to “serve the police”.

According to an update on the Facebook post, the employee was fired after the franchise owner was contacted about the incident. The owner also issued a statement of regret. From the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

Freda Thornton, the franchise owner, said in a statement Tuesday that her restaurants are dedicated to serving all customers, “including all authority figures who protect our wildlife and natural resources.” “We regret this situation as it goes against our standards of providing a welcoming experience to everyone, and we have taken the appropriate action to resolve this situation,” Thornton said in the statement.

Naff’s wife said, “This is such an eye opener for me as to what the people who protect us have to go through on a daily basis.”

This is not the first time something like this has happened at a McDonald’s. Last July there was a similar incident in Texas when a female worker refused to serve food to an off-duty police officer who was having dinner with his family:

A McDonald’s worker in Texas was fired Wednesday after refusing to provide service to a police officer, CBS Houston affiliate KHOU-TV reports. The owners of the McDonald’s franchise in Brenham said the actions of their employee were completely unacceptable, and police said it was the right thing to do. “Nobody deserves to be treated like that,” Brenham Police Chief Craig Goodman told the station.

But not all of the stories involving McDonald’s employees and police have been negative. Earlier this year, a McDonald’s employee in Florida realized an off-duty police officer had passed out while waiting for her food in the drive-thru line. The employee leaped out the window and chased after the car, then ran back inside to alert others inside, one of whom happened to be a paramedic who was able to provide medical attention.

Here’s a local news story on the incident in Virginia: