The brother of a Sydney man left “terrified” after being subjected to gay hate speech by a real estate agent has faced court charged with allegedly assaulting the businessman in his office.
Last Wednesday, real estate agent Mohammad Mahinul Abedin was filmed hurling abuse at a barista inside a cafe in the inner west suburb of Homebush.
The footage showed Mr Abedin calling the barista a “f***ing f****t”.
“Absolute f***ot,” Mr Abedin says. “Look at his eyes. You’re messing with the wrong person.”
The barista, 34, who asked not to be named, told news.com.au he was “terrified” to go back to work.
Today, a Sydney court heard that the barista’s older brother, Ryan Bell, 38, walked over to Mr Abedin’s office after the incident to confront him.
In CCTV footage obtained exclusively by news.com.au, Mr Bell can be seen confronting Mr Abedin, who was seated at a desk.
He was heard asking, “were you just in the cafe?” and “did you just call my brother a f****t?”.
“If you ever f***ing come in there, you’re f***ing dead bro,” Mr Bell says.
“Don’t ever walk in that f***ing place again. You’re lucky I don’t f***ing slap your head now you stupic c***.”
As Mr Abedin stands up, Mr Bell pushes him back into his chair, telling him “sit the f*** down, I swear to God I’ll kill you”.
Mr Bell fronted Burwood Local Court, in Sydney’s inner west, on Thursday after being issued with an apprehended domestic violence order and a field court attendance notice for one charge of assault following the altercation.
The real estate agent last week told news.com.au he was sorry for using derogatory remarks, but claimed he had been sprayed on the hand with a cleaning agent and touched “inappropriately” by the barista — a claim the barista labelled “insane”.
In footage that was shared on social media after the initial confrontation, Mr Abedin can be seen interjecting in the barista’s phone call as he calls police for help, telling him to relay to police that he was “also calling you a d**khead”.
Mr Bell told Magistrate Richard Funston on Thursday he had only been issued a court notice a day earlier and the situation had been “very strange”.
The matter was adjourned until October 27 and Mr Bell was advised to seek legal aid prior to his next appearance.
In the meantime, he was instructed to not approach or get within 50 metres of Mr Abedin.
Outside court, Mr Bell claimed to news.com.au the video of his altercation had been edited to remove key pieces of evidence.
His dad, Stephen Bell, the owner of the cafe, said it had been distressing to see how severely his barista son had been affected by Mr Abedin’s homophobic comments.
“When you see how upset my son was, it was pretty bad,” he told news.com.au.
Mr Bell’s response, he said, “was retaliation to the ferocity of the attack on his brother and the homophobic insults”.
Days earlier, Stephen Bell said he attended a meeting with Mr Abedin to discuss a local council initiative, which he now no longer wishes to be involved with.
Stephen said working in hospitality was already difficult enough without diners making verbal attacks on his staff and children.
“In hospitality, we cop it from all angles and it can be a really unpleasant environment already but some people want to take it to next level and make it personal,” he said.
He added that Mr Abedin was a regular customer of his cafe, and had always seemed “arrogant and entitled”.
In Mr Abedin’s apology, he said he was “distressed”.
“I can’t comment on this matter as it part of legal proceedings,” Mr Abedin said.
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“I apologise for my comments but I was distressed after being touched inappropriately and having cleaning chemicals sprayed on me by him.”
Mr Abedin’s name and image have been removed from the real estate agency’s website following news.com.au’s story earlier this week.
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