A woman was arrested Monday morning at a McDonald’s restaurant in Ravenna, Ohio after assaulting two staff members in an attack that was caught on video and viewed more than a million times on Facebook. The woman, identified as Cherysse Helena Cleveland by Cleveland 19 News, was spotted by eyewitness Brian Allen asking for a slushie with three flavors combined. When the manager said they wouldn’t be able to carry out that order, Cleveland tried to go behind the counter to do it herself.
The video begins when Cleveland becomes physical in her encounter with staff members, who try to block her from going behind the counter. Cleveland then punches the manager in the side of the head while yelling obscenities. She then pushes two workers and pulls off the manager’s face masks, responding when an employee said they would call the police, “Go ahead, I don’t give a f—,” and “I will go to f—ing prison.”
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Cleveland then punches another employee in the face, who pushes her to the ground and starts punching her in return before the manager stops her. Cleveland goes back to the customer area before turning around and once again attacking the staff. Police eventually show up and Cleveland is placed in handcuffs. Newsweek reports that one employee had red marks and swelling on her face and cuts around her nose and eye, but no medical treatment was requested.
Cleveland was charged with two counts of misdemeanor assault in Portage County, according to Cleveland 19 News. She reportedly pleaded not guilty and was ordered not to return to that McDonald’s or have any contact with the employees. Her bond set was at $1,000. Cleveland reportedly was previously charged with felonious assault, kidnapping and disrupting public service in 2014, serving time after attacking her grandmother.
During her previous case, Cleveland wrote the judge letters asking for leniency, according to Cleveland 19 News. In one of her letters, Cleveland reportedly wrote that she was “not of sound mind and body” when attacking her grandmother and had struggled with mental illness. “I am not an evil or bad person. I had some very difficult things going on in my life… I did not mean to assault my grandmother. In my mind at the time I thought I was fighting the devil,” she wrote, adding later, “Before the incident I worked at my job for 16 years and tried to be a good citizen.”
