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July 2005 · Readings · Previous · Next   PDFPDF

Or the highway

From a two-and-a-half-minute 911 call to the Orange County, California, Sheriff’s Department, which verified its authenticity in March after an audio file was posted on snopes.com.

DISPATCHER: Sheriff’s Department. How can I help you?

CALLER: Yeah, I’m over here at the Burger King drive-through in Laguna Niguel, I think.

DISPATCHER: Uh-huh.

CALLER: I asked them four different times to make me a Western Barbecue Burger. Okay, they keep giving me a hamburger with lettuce, tomato, and cheese, onions, and I said I’m not leaving. I want a Western Burger because I just got my kids from tae kwon do, they’re hungry, I’m on my way home, and I live in San Clemente.

DISPATCHER: Uh-huh.

CALLER: Okay, she gave me another hamburger. It’s wrong. I said I want my hamburger right. So then the manager—she came up and she said, um, “Did you want your money back?” And I said no. I want my hamburger. My kids are hungry, and I have to jump on the freeway. I said, I am not leaving this spot, and I said, I will call the police, because I want my Western Burger done right. Now, is that so hard?

DISPATCHER: Ma’am, we’re not going to go down there and enforce your Western Bacon Cheeseburger.

CALLER: What am I supposed to do?

DISPATCHER: I suggest you get your money back and go somewhere else. This is not a criminal issue. We can’t go out there and make them make you a cheeseburger the way you want it.

CALLER: You’re supposed to be here to protect me.

DISPATCHER: Is this like . . . a harmful cheeseburger or something? I don’t understand what you want us to do.

CALLER: Just come down here. I’m not leaving.

DISPATCHER: No ma’am, I’m not sending the deputies down there over a cheeseburger. You need to go in there and act like an adult and either get your money back or go home.

CALLER: She is not acting like an adult herself! I’m sitting here in my car; I just want them to make my kids a Western Burger.

DISPATCHER: Ma’am, I suggest you get your money back from the manager and you go on your way home. Okay? Bye-bye.



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SEE ALSO: Burger King Corporation; Consumer complaints; Emergency reporting systems; Orange County; Telephone
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