A Colorado man was arrested Monday after allegedly going on a racist and homophobic rant against two college students, who were eating at an In-N-Out in the Bay Area on Christmas Eve. The students, Arine Kim and Elliot Ha, filmed the encounter in a now-viral TikTok.
Jordan Douglas Krah, 40, has been charged with two counts of committing a hate crime, according to a statement from the San Ramon Police Department.
In the video, Krah is allegedly seen harassing Kim and Ha, making comments about their sexualities and asking questions about their racial identities and ethnicities, even returning to question the duo after walking away. He then threatens to spit in their faces before saying, “See you outside.”
“Elliot and I were shaking and stuttering towards the end of it,” Kim told CBS Bay Area, who said that after the pair exited the restaurant, Krah continued to stare at them for “ten to fifteen minutes.”
“We made sure to ask the workers, could you guys walk us to our cars, we need to make sure that he’s not still around. And the workers were just super helpful,” Ha told CBS Bay Area.
According to the San Ramon Police Department, it was the viral nature of the video that helped police identify both the victims and the suspect.
After seeing the TikTok, which had nearly ten million views as of Monday night, police reached out to Kim and Ha via social media and began a criminal investigation.
“Through the help of social media, we were contacted by one of the individuals in this video,” wrote San Ramon Police Chief Denton Carlson on Twitter.
Krah has been booked at the County Jail in Martinez, California, where he remained in custody as of 4 p.m. local time Monday.
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