Jasmine LaRoche was selling lemonade and cookies for only 10 minutes when the unidentified grouch approached and demanded to see her "business license."
A California man tried to rain on a child’s parade when he threatened to call the police because her lemonade stand did not have a “business license,” the girl’s outraged father said.
Jasmine LaRoche had been selling lemonade and cookies for only 10 minutes when the unidentified grouch approached and demanded to know what right she had to set up shop in the neighborhood.
When the budding entrepreneur couldn’t come up with an answer good enough for him, the man said he was calling the cops.
“Whoever the man (I wouldn’t call you that if I didn’t have to) was that threatened to call the police on my daughter for her lemonade stand, you are seriously pathetic,” Jasmine's father Richard LaRoche, of Discovery Bay, wrote on Facebook. “She is trying to do something constructive with her time and you hassled her for no good reason. Sorry if her ambition threatened you.”
Read: Man Threatened to Feed 8-Year-Old Boy To Alligators: Cops
The man’s threats were enough to send the girl running home crying, afraid she was going to get in trouble with local law enforcement, her dad said.
“I understand that you are upholding the ‘law’ but really dude?” Richard LaRoche wrote. “You’re the reason why kids lack ambition nowadays, fear caused by schmucks like you, you are a sad individual.
“She said you picked up your phone and said you were calling the police. We all know you did that to intimidate her, just sad and pathetic.”
The man’s tactics may have worked at first, but Richard LaRoche encouraged his daughter to set up a second stand, this time in front of their home.
Read: 9-Year-Old Girl Sets Up Lemonade Stand to Save Town Library
“I told her how much our community supported her when I posted what happened,” he told KTVU-TV. “She was so surprised and encouraged."
Dozens of neighbors flocked to the stand to show their support, he said, noting Jasmine ended her business day by serving two police officers.
“Jasmine had an awesome [turnout] for her lemonade stand," he wrote. "Thank you to everyone that came out and showed support."
Watch: Dozens of Officers Show Up to Lemonade Stand of Girl Who Dreams of Being a Cop
