CHARLESTON, SC (WCSC) -A Walterboro convenience store owner who is under fire for asking a cancer survivor to cover his face is speaking for the first time.
Kirby Evans, who lost one eye and his nose while fighting cancer claims he was mistreated at Forks Pit Stop in Walterboro.
Evans is a regular customer there.
He says on Oct. 8, someone grabbed him and jerked him into the store office.
The store owner, Donna Crosby believes he was talking about her.
The surveillance video Crosby provided us does not show Evans being grabbed or dragged into the office.
“I never touched him. You can see that on camera. I never touched him. I wanted to have a nice heart to heart conversation with Mr. Evans," Crosby said Tuesday, “I asked him if maybe the doctor had given him an eye patch or something that he could cover the hole on his face whenever he came to dine in at the Fork and and if I can help him in any way with doing anything for him because I wanted it to be a situation that would work for me as well as him because I appreciated Mr. Evans' business.”
Crosby says she wanted Evans to cover his face because it was hurting her business.
“I had customers complain. I’ve seen customers get up and throw their plates in the trash and walk out. It was affecting her business," Crosby said.
Crosby says she was not rude while talking to Evans and never asked him to leave the store.
“If I had asked him to leave my store, I would have thought he would have slammed the door and walked out the front door, and he walked down the aisle," Crosby said.
She says Evans bought some food and then left on his bicycle.
Crosby says she wants to keep him as a customer.
Evans wasn’t available for comment, but his daughter said that Crosby’s words hurt far worse than whether she put her hands on him or not.
Walterboro store owner under fire says she didn’t grab cancer survivor; Video released
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