Feral cats raided the Margarett and Herman Brown Library Starbucks the Thursday night before Easter.
According to student workers, the staff had followed protocol in closing the cafe. In preparation for the upcoming holiday weekend, they took extra measures in cleaning the facility and restocking supplies for re-opening on Monday. It looked like an average night for the team as they finished serving students and closing at 11:00 p.m.
“We just did the same old thing we do every night, which includes making some last minute drinks for those students who stumble in right before we close, and heating up any baked good items upon request,” said Terry Thompson, a junior education major from Tyler, Texas. “Since we have Friday off, it was not as busy as it usually is and we decided to start cleaning up earlier than we normally do”.
The team closed the kitchen first. Once the food items were off limits, they carefully organized the baked goods in storage before completely closing the store and doing the same with the espresso beans, coffee grounds, and flavored syrups. By 10:45 p.m everything was set in its place. At 11:00 p.m the staff was dismissed for the weekend.
Kennedy King, a senior marketing major from Frankfort, Kentucky said, “We were all cleaned up and ready to go. It had been a long week for the cafe and after all of our hard work in organizing the store, we were all looking forward to catching a break. We had no idea what was to come.”
When the workers returned on Monday at 7 a.m. to prepare for the morning rush, they were in shock. All of the effort put into cleaning and organizing was destroyed. There were spilled bottles of syrup and coffee grounds on the floor everywhere. The baked goods storage had also been rummaged through with a dozen plastic bags ripped open with half eaten croissant and cheese danishes.
The only clue as to who could do such a thing was found in the coffee ground paw prints that led a trail from the Starbucks to the main doors of the library. The Acu Police Department identified the prints as belonging to cats and has sent out a warrant to bring all feral cats into their office for further questioning. There will be no extreme penalty for this incident, but for feral cats involved in this crime, they will be forced to serve time as a student worker for the next three months. Be sure to order a cappuccino from a feral cat today.