Add Teresa Sue Klein, now known as “Cornerstone Caroline,” to the ever-growing list of white people who have called the cops on black people for doing absolutely nothing.
The viral incident, captured earlier this week and reported by the New York Post, shows Klein phoning the police to claim that a 9-year-old child “grabbed my ass” in a Brooklyn bodega and that his mother proceeded to “yell at me.”
The child and his younger sister can be heard crying to their mother throughout the video. As she realizes she’s being recorded, Klein acknowledges to the crowd, “White lady calls the cops on black lady, I get it.”
9-year-old child brushes against white woman in grocery story. She calls cops and accuses him of sexual assault.
This is too much. pic.twitter.com/0nMX2Advt7
— Simran Jeet Singh (@SikhProf) October 12, 2018
One onlooker can be heard in the video dubbing her “Cornerstone Caroline,” a reference to the alliterative nicknames other white women have received for calling the cops on totally innocent black people.
“Barbecue Becky,” for example, called the cops on a family that was grilling food in a public park’s designated grilling zone. “Permit Patty” called the cops on an 8-year-old for “illegally selling water without a permit.”
Surveillance video from the bodega quickly surfaced showing that the child in question passed by Klein without noticing her, but perhaps accidentally brushed her with the bag he was carrying in his hand or the backpack on his back.
When reporters tried to ask Klein about the incident at her home, she called the cops on them too.
UPDATE: Spoke to the woman who called police on a child. Her name is Theresa (the internet has dubbed her #cornerstorecaroline )
She called the cops on me and another reporter. @PIX11News pic.twitter.com/ugmnUX3cqf
— Andrew Ramos (@AndrewRamosTV) October 12, 2018
When she eventually spoke to reporters, she apologized to the two children, but not to their mother. “I would like to apologize to her daughter and her son but not to her. She could have walked away, but she didn’t. I’m also a Buddhist, [but] I let my temper show,” she said. “I’ve been called racist before, and I’m not.”
Her neighbors tell a different story, however. Hazel Freeman, a pastor who lives above Klein, told The Post that she’s “terrorizing the building” and has even led some neighbors to move out. “She would call me up and tell me my son is smoking weed in the hallway. He’s married and he lives in Canarsie,” he said, referring to farther out neighborhood in Brooklyn.
The list of white people who have called the cops on black people is far longer than just those who have received nicknames. Other incidents involved a man who refused to believe an African-American woman and her child were members of his community pool, a woman who called the cops because a black man was wearing socks at the pool, a woman who called the cops on a black Yale grad student for taking a nap in his residence hall, and a black firefighter who was reported for doing his job conducting inspections.