Restaurants & Bars

Video Shows Vice Principal Tossing Beer At Smithville Diners

The vice principal tossed the beer at NJ restaurant diners after his wife complained that a transgender woman used a bathroom, reports say.

SMITHVILLE, NJ — A New Jersey vice principal tossed beer at restaurant diners after his wife complained that a transgender woman used the restaurant's bathroom this weekend, reports say (see video below).

Michael Smurro, a vice principal at Neptune High School, tossed the beer after his wife argued with patrons over a transgender woman using the women’s bathroom with her at Fred & Ethel’s Lantern Light and Tavern in the Smithville section of Galloway Township on Saturday, according to NJ Advance Media.

Smurro said in an email to The Associated Press on Tuesday that he regrets throwing his beer when he and his wife realized other patrons were filming them.

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“I allowed my emotions to get in the way of my normally sound judgment and reacted in a way that was inappropriate,” he wrote in the email to The Associated Press. “I do not condone violence or discrimination of any kind and should have simply walked away. I apologize to the person I threw my beer at and wish I hadn’t done so. I apologize to anyone I offended.”

The district’s superintendent, Tami Crader, told NJ Advance Media she’d just learned of the incident and it is under investigation, “and will be taken seriously.”

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The woman, whom NJ Advance Media identified as Lisa Smurro, made repeated transphobic remarks and made them loudly and within earshot of three outdoor dining tables at the restaurant.

The incident was shown here – viewer discretion advised for language:

The woman later told BreakingAC the manager took responsibility because there are bathrooms designated “for people like that,” according to BreakingAC.

“It’s not OK,” the woman says several times, according to BreakingAC. “She’s a man using my bathroom.”

“She literally just started going off, loud as hell, without cause,” said the woman who shot the videos, asking that she only be identified by her first name, Carrie, for safety reasons, according to BreakingAC.

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