Worthless security

To the Editor:

Wednesday, February 1, I discovered that Penn's security is worthless.

I went to McDonald's, and as I was waiting to order a community member asked me to get him a burger which I agreed to. While waiting for the food, he asked someone else to order something for him too.

Since McDonald's has no sense of order, the second order came first and the community member started eating his burger.

Unhappy with it, he asked for mayonnaise, at which point a disgruntled McDonald's employee told him off for begging there.

He yelled, they yelled back, and he yelled louder. I got my food, and meanwhile looked to see what was happening.

One foot away from me the man stood with a knife half concealed in his right hand. I grabbed my bag of food and rushed away, but he turned to me and stated, "Where's my burger?"

I stepped back, gave him the burger and tried very hard to stay out of "stab range." The Penn police came and threw him out.

I told the policeman that the man had a knife, to which he responded, "Really? I didn't see that, where did he go?"

It was not his fault, since he was the only policeman working and couldn't see everything.

That is exactly the problem though; even the increased security isn't adequate.

I didn't know where the knifer went, and they didn't find him. I do not know what had gone through this man's head to spur him to pull out a knife; maybe he was simply irrational.

Regardless, McDonald's should look carefully at the surveillance tapes (assuming they have) and find the guy. More importantly, I believe that something must be done to help poverty because, in spite of increased security, this man had the chance to stab me if he chose too.

The policeman didn't even know he had a knife.

Eric Tal

College senior

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