JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A Riverside bakery owner captured on camera the moments that he was harassed with bigoted remarks by a total stranger.
Alex Podlas, the owner of Bakery Ribault, said he was trying to park Wednesday at the Publix in Five Points when a man approached his vehicle in the parking lot and began hurling obscenities and insults. Podlas recorded the confrontation on his phone.
The seven-minute video was uploaded to Facebook, where it has been viewed more than 20,000 times and has attracted a lot of attention. Podlas said he has no idea who the man is, and News4Jax has been unable to independently confirm the man’s identity.
In the opening seconds of the clip, the man calls Podlas a derogatory slur for homosexual people. “Why don’t you get the (expletive) out of our country?” the man can later be heard saying.
Seated in the driver’s seat of his vehicle, Podlas can be heard repeatedly asking the man to back away. “I want you to get away from the car,” he said. “I want you to get away from the car so I can exit the car.”
Podlas told News4Jax he drove to Publix from his bakery to pick up a few ingredients. As he was parking, the man walked past and then tried to block Podlas from parking in a space.
At first, Podlas thought the other man was joking around. He didn’t think much of it until the man came up to his car and refused to leave him alone.
“He kind of like stands there waiting for me,” the bakery owner recalled. “I was already parked. I looked to my right and he’s giving me the finger. He’s trying to tell me something, so I roll down the window and I ask him, ‘What can I do for you? What seems to be the problem?’”
“And that’s when he starts telling me, ‘Why don’t you get the (expletive) out of our country?’” he added.
The abuse didn’t stop there. The insults continued with the man calling Podlas a “Russian coward,” making barking noises and threatening physical violence.
“When you stop recording this and I stop recording, I’m going to wait for you to come out of this store and I’m going to beat the (expletive) out of you,” the man said. To which Podlas replied, “Okay, works for me. Works for me.”
The back-and-forth jawing carried on for about seven minutes.
There has been an outpouring of reaction to the video on social media with many users coming to Podlas’ defense. But some users questioned why he indulged the man instead of leaving.
"The reason why I didn't drive away was because I was afraid he would fake some kind of negligence accident and lie about it," Podlas told News4Jax. "I just wanted him to get away from the car where there would be safe distance and I could do whatever I want to do."
Eventually, a Publix employee showed up. The conversation isn’t audible, but ultimately the man walked away and Podlas went grocery shopping at a different store. Podlas said he’s not sure if he’s going to file a police report about the incident.
