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AmericaYoom Nguyen drew his gun when a group of people broke into his Lotus restaurant in Minneapolis, but he ultimately decided not to pull the trigger.
It was the night of Aug. 26, when looters swept through downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota, after police shot and killed a murder suspect. Although the police tried to quell the rumors by posting a video of the incident, stating that the person died by suicide, the violence still erupted.
Nguyen was present at the Lotus restaurant when he saw the crowd from 10 to 80 in just a few minutes.
“I told some people that ‘there is nothing here for you, don’t mess with us,'” Nguyen said.
Lotus Restaurant in Minneapolis after being ransacked the night of Aug. 26. Image: Yoom Nguyen.
However, they ignored him, initially stoning and then throwing a fire extinguisher. Five people jumped into the restaurant, one pointed to Nguyen’s family photo and threw something. This action caused Nguyen to withdraw his weapon. He got a gun license, but in the end he didn’t shoot.
“I saw the anger and fear in him and I cried,” he said. “I go home and cry. I stay up all night and cry.”
Nguyen’s family opened the Lotus restaurant in 1984. His American dream was shattered overnight by several vandals.
“In small restaurants like this, you won’t get anything,” Nguyen said. “What are they going to get, egg roll? They don’t, they don’t even go to the kitchen.”
Nguyen thinks the person confronting him could be a 17-year-old teenager. It was a difficult night. Lotus was one of dozens of properties destroyed that night in Minneapolis.
The police showed up pretty quickly and the crowd fled in disarray. He was moved to see many people in nearby apartments coming out onto the balconies cheering for the police and calling for an end to the chaos.
Governor Tim Walz declared a state of emergency in Minneapolis and deployed a patrol force with the state National Guard to deal with “illegal violence and looting” in the city center. 33 people were arrested overnight, 16 people were charged with robbery in the second and third degree.
“Seeing the family restaurant robbers broke our hearts,” Nguyen wrote on Facebook the next morning. “They did it while smiling.”
In addition to the mental shock, Nguyen also suffered some material damage. He said the restaurant windows were broken, the walls smashed, the cash register was stolen.
“Most of the damage to small businesses like ours is covered and covered by the owner. We don’t want to lose our insurance. Without it, we can’t function,” he said.
Yoom Nguyen at his Lotus restaurant in Minneapolis. Image: Fox9.
This year in particular, his restaurant suffered 3 waves of riots, of which the riots following the death of the color George Floyd in May were the largest.
“We are very resistant. My father and mother are very resistant. We come from a country devastated by war, rebuilding things is not something strange for them,” said Nguyen.
“But they kept showing up all the time,” Nguyen’s mother said. “I can’t believe it. Very, very sad.”
Many people in the community expressed their support for the Lotus restaurant. One woman even offered to do what she could to reimburse Nguyen’s family after the sabotage.
“75% of our clients are,” he said. “We both know each other’s names.”
“They love my family very much,” her mother added. “And I love them very much too. When I meet a client, they are exactly like my family.”
Mr. Ngoc (According to the Fox9, Kare11, patch)
