Santa Con revelers trash San Francisco restaurant, hurl sugar jar at worker, videos show
A San Francisco restaurant was trashed on Saturday — and a worker was nearly hit with a flying sugar jar — as drunken Santa Con attendees rolled through, video from the scene shows.
Workers at the Pakistani cafe Shalimar on Polk Street said two women attacked them and shattered a glass door around 7 p.m. during the city’s 24th-annual Santa Con, a pub crawl in which revelers dress up as Santa Claus, KTVU reports.
Taylor Savvy, a regular at the restaurant, shared video on Facebook showing one woman picking up a chair and smashing it into the glass.
“Out of control,” one person in the background says just before the chair shatters the glass.
The woman then walks away, clutching a Santa hat in one of her hands. The video has been seen more than 30,000 times on Facebook alone.
“Please share and help figure out who these drunk #santacon partiers are, they assaulted an employee and trashed my favorite Pakistani restaurant in #SF after they were asked to leave for loitering on Saturday night,” Savvy wrote on Facebook Monday.
Another video shared by Savvy shows a woman launching a sugar jar at workers, as a restaurant employee and a person in a Santa hat try to restrain her. The floor of the restaurant is covered with restaurant items like the cash register that appear to have been pushed off the counter.
Video of the attack inside the restaurant has been seen more than 20,000 on Facebook.
Savvy said in an email to McClatchy that employee Alejo Cano Chan gave him the video to share online in hopes of catching the suspects. Chan recorded the video of the attack inside the restaurant, while an unnamed passerby caught the woman breaking the door from the outside and sent it to Cano, Savvy said.
San Francisco police said they are still looking for the two women captured in the videos.
“We haven’t received any tips. We are waiting for anyone who can identify these two suspects,” said San Francisco police officer Robert Rueca, according to KGO. He added the suspects are both women between 20 and 25.
Shalimar closed for the day after the women’s rampage, KGO reports. Police said it’s not clear the women were involved in Santa Con. Witnesses described both women as visibly drunk, according to the TV station.
Chan said the women grew violent after demanding that workers give them food they had not ordered, KTVU reports.
“She says give me my food, we say you didn’t order any food, show us the receipt,” Chan said, according to the TV station “and if you have the receipt, we can give you the food, but no receipt.”
The woman who threw the sugar canister also punched workers, KTVU reports.
Seven San Francisco Santas were arrested for public intoxication this year. Even more Santas needed medical help: Medics had to treat fifteen Santas “for being drunk, tipsy, wobbly, sick or in other conditions brought on by excessive good cheer,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Chan said he just wants the women to cover the damage to the restaurant — and for police to beef up Santa Con security next year, KPIX reports.
This story was originally published December 11, 2018 at 7:27 PM with the headline "Santa Con revelers trash San Francisco restaurant, hurl sugar jar at worker, videos show."