A video posted to social media showing one man preventing another from leaving a local grocery store has led London police to conduct an investigation to see if the incident was a hate crime.
Constable George Demopoulos said officers with the London Police Service were called to the Sobey's grocery store on Adelaide St. N while the incident was taking place on Tuesday at around 7pm.
A video, which was posted to Facebook on Wednesday, shows a man in a red t-shirt referring to another man wearing a black hoodie as an "illegal alien" as he tries to stop him from leaving the store.
"I want to leave. Stop assaulting me," the victim said in the 30-second video, which was shot before police arrived. "I want to leave."
During the video, a woman behind the camera could be heard urging the man in red to stop what he was doing.
"Don't touch him. Why are you touching him?" she said. "Let's go, he can't make a citizen's arrest."
Demopoulos said when officers arrived it was learned that an argument had taken place between the two men prior to the incident shown in the video. While he said race "played a role" in what happened, Demopoulos couldn't confirm if a hate crime had occurred.
The 33-year-old man in the black hoodie chose not to press assault charges against the 39-year-old man in red, Demopoulos said. Neither of the men was injured and both left the store peacefully.
The London Police Service Hate Crime Unit is reviewing the incident.