A 77-year-old Villager has entered a plea in an alleged Whopper-throwing racial tirade at the Burger King restaurant at Trailwinds Village in Wildwood.
Judith Ann Black of the Village of Pine Ridge pleaded not guilty to a felony charge of battery on Thursday in Sumter County Court. She entered the plea through her newly retained attorney, J. Scott Herman, who recently enabled a Villager to escape prosecution in a heated parking dispute at a villa community in Florida’s Friendliest Hometown.
Black remains free on $2,500 bond.
The story, first reported in Villages-News.com, has garnered nationwide attention.
The Texas native was apparently enraged over the thickness of the tomato served in her Whopper sandwich on the evening of April 30 and confronted a Burger King employee at the counter, according to an arrest report from the Wildwood Police Department.
The Burger King worker tried to convince Black to calm down and said she could not help her if she did not stop yelling. The worker turned her back on Black, who threw the Whopper at the employee, hitting her in the back, the report said.
“Shut up you black bitch,” the Villager told the employee.
Black proceeded to use the “N” word before storming out of the restaurant, the report said.
The Burger King manager, a worker at Burger King and an independent customer all verified the employee’s account of what happened. Video surveillance footage also corroborated what the employee told law enforcement.
Another employee captured the license plate of the white Dodge Ram pickup in which Black was traveling when it left the parking lot.
Officers tracked down Black and read her the Miranda Rights. She admitted she had confronted the Burger King employee at the counter over the tomato on her Whopper. She said she was “angry” that the employee was not “fixing the issue,” the report said. She admitted she “had the burger in my hand and tossed it at her.” She confirmed it hit the Burger King worker.
“Ms. Black also stated that she called the victim a ‘stupid black bitch,’” the report said.
Because of the racial language used by Black, “this enhances the charge of Battery from a misdemeanor of the first degree to a felony of the third degree under Florida State Statute 775.085,” the officer wrote in the arrest report.
