Orlando: Sikh musician says he was profiled after concerned citizen found his flute case suspicious
Neelamjit Dhillon posted on his Instagram account that a police official came up to him and checked his bag while he was eating at a local restaurant.
A Sikh musician, Neelamjit Dhillon, on Thursday said he was racially profiled at Chili’s, a restaurant in Orlando, United States, after a fellow patron complained that they had seen a “suspicious man carrying a suspicious container”, BuzzFeed News reported. The police official apologised to him and left after he showed them that the container in question was the case in which he keeps his flutes.
Dhillon posted about the incident on his Instagram account, saying, “A concerned citizen called the police to investigate me while having lunch because of my suspicious container. Just my bamboo flutes :) #musicianlife #eattingwhilesikh #thanksorlando.”
Dhillon told the news website that he and his family members had been mistaken for being Muslim, and profiled as terrorists before as well. “If someone just asked a question, and if someone didn’t come to conclusions based on appearances, they might just learn something about people,” he said.
Dhillon, who is originally from Los Angeles, had recently moved to Orlando to work as a music director for a show at Disney World, a popular theme part in the state of Florida. The city of Orlando has been tense over the past few weeks after a mass shooting on June 12, in which a man named Omar Mateen killed at least 49 people and injured 53 others.
