Waiter Spits In Drink At Chili’s Restaurant, Cops Use DNA To Find Out Who Did It


A waiter spit in a drink at a Chili’s restaurant, thinking he would get away with it. However, unfortunately for him, the police were able to use a crime lab to test the DNA and determine who did it.

According to ABC News, the incident took place last July when Ken Yerdon and his wife, Julie Aluzzo Yerdon, went out to dinner at a Chili’s restaurant on Route 31 in Clay, New York. When the couple received their dinner, the food was reportedly under-cooked and they never received their chips and salsa. Doing what any other patron would do, Yerdon complained to his waiter Gregory Lamica. Although the meal wasn’t what they were hoping for, the couple still left the waiter a generous tip.

“They were polite to the server, and even left a tip,” Robert Lahm, the Yerdon’s lawyer told the news site.

“We weren’t rude or anything,” Ken said. “It was a busy night but we didn’t expect for our food to get spit in,” he added.

“We were patient with him, but we could tell he was annoyed with us,” Aluzzo-Yerdon told the Syracuse Post-Standard. “All Ken said to him was, ‘Are you OK? Have we done something to offend you?’ And he said, ‘Oh, no, no.'”

Ken explained that he only made the nasty discovery after the lid of his to-go cup popped off. When he looked in his drink, he was shocked and disgusted by what he saw.

“The lid popped off and I looked in and there was some spit in the cup,” Yerdon said. “It wasn’t regular spit either. It was definitely a loogie.”

Ken then took a picture of the cup, drove his wife and 12-year-old son to their home, and returned to the restaurant where he asked to speak to the manager. They apologized, but would not admit that one of their employees were responsible. They refunded his meal and offered him coupons for his next visit. However, Lamica was not fired.

“We just felt like he needed to be terminated immediately,” Julie said. “To do something like that was so vile and beyond the pale. We couldn’t believe it.”

As the left the Chili’s restaurant, Ken saw Gregory sobbing in the parking lot. He approached him and asked him why he spit in his drink.

“I said, ‘Why did you spit in my drink?'” Yerdon told the police in a statement. “He was bawling. He just kept walking with his apron in his hand and he didn’t answer me. I said to him, ‘You wouldn’t be crying if you didn’t spit in my drink.’ He said, ‘I don’t want to lose my job.'”

The Yerdon’s contacted the police and an investigator spoke with Lamica, who denied the incident. However, he did allow the investigator to take a DNA swab from his mouth. When the results came in several months later, it proved that it was in fact Gregory Lamica who spit in Ken’s soft drink. Although he continued to deny the accusations, he eventually confessed when he was presented with the positive DNA results.

Gregory plead guilty to disorderly conduct, and was sentenced to a one-year conditional discharge and a $125 surcharge. The Yerdons plan to sue Lamica and the owners of Chili’s later this week for the emotional trauma they endured following the incident. Because Ken had taken several sips of the drink before he noticed anything was wrong, they were concerned that he could have contracted HIV or hepatitis. While Ken initially tested negative for both, he had to wait an additional six months to be tested again.

“It was a long six months of anxiety,” Julie said.

[Photo by Ken Wolter / Shutterstock.com]

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