Black delivery driver shares video of man quizzing him in affluent white San Francisco neighbourhood

‘He wouldn't have harassed me of I was of a lighter complexion,’ says worker

Gino Spocchia
Friday 04 June 2021 19:23 BST
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Video showing a delivery driver being quizzed by a white man in San Francisco
Video showing a delivery driver being quizzed by a white man in San Francisco (LostCourierCollective/Instagram)

A Black delivery driver in San Francisco has gone viral after he shared a video of him being quizzed by a resident of an affluent white neighbourhood.

In footage shared to Instagram on Thursday, the unidentified delivery driver was approached by a white man asking for identification in the area of Pacific Heights.

“Who the f*** are you,” the delivery man says, asking the unidentified white man to put a mask on. “Why do you think that I have to identify myself?"

“I want identification,” the man says to the delivery driver. "Who are you with? Who are those addressed to?"

"It's none of your business," the deliveryman then replies. "Every time I come around here, motherf*****s like you make my job harder."

According to a caption on the video, the delivery man was trying to deliver medicine in the neighbourhood of Pacific Heights when the incident occurred.

"For those who don't know its reputation, pac heights is one of the most affluent, snobby, and white neighbourhoods in San Francisco," the video caption reads.

"It's a neighbourhood of old money, unlike the heavily gentrified neighbourhoods where new tech money has displaced historically black and brown communities. Everyone who grew up here knows that.”

It continues by saying that the delivery driver will “rarely cross” into the area “because this type of thing is a common occurrence in my everyday life".

The video continues with the white man refusing to back away because the delivery driver will not identify himself.

The white man indicates that he will phone the police, before the delivery driver reminds him that is illegal in San Francisco to make false 911 calls of a discriminatory nature — following a spate of incidents in 2020.

“He then followed me to the halfway house I was delivering to and stood in my way as I tried to leave. I've never seen this guy before in my life.” the delivery driver added in the caption.

"I posed no threat to his safety or his property,” he went on, [and] I have a strong feeling that he wouldn't have harassed me of I was of a lighter complexion, but this is an everyday thing when you're a man of colour living in America."

The footage from Thursday has since been viewed more than 100,000 times, and is the latest in a series of incidents involving Black Americans.

It includes the case of Amy Cooper, a white woman who last year threatened to call 911 on Christian Cooper, a Black birdwatcher in New York’s Central Park.

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