UConn Mac-and-Cheese Student Posts Apology Video: ‘I Am Ashamed'

Luke Gatti, the UConn student arrested after being caught on camera berating a food service worker on campus, has posted an apology on YouTube.

"I want to start by apologizing to all the staff involved in my incident, especially the manager," Gatti said in the two-and-a-half-minute video posted on Sunday. "He was just doing his job. He gave me so many chances to walk away and I didn't listen to him, but I was a complete a**hole to him instead and no one deserves to be treated that way, like ever."

Gatti was arrested Oct. 4 after he refused to leave Union Street Market when he was refused service because he had been drinking in the market, according to a UConn police report.

A nine-minute expletive-laden video of the incident was posted on YouTube the next day that showed Gatti demanding to be served bacon-jalapeno mac and cheese and yelling at the market's manager, who had asked Gatti to leave. The video has since been removed.

"At the time, I was, to say the least, very intoxicated," Gatti said in his apology. "When I watched the video a few days later, I couldn't even believe it was me in it. I was just watching it, thinking, 'oh my God.'"

Gatti was seen shoving the manager several times as students tried to intervene. He was eventually restrained by a market employee and the manager before police arrived and arrested him.

"This isn't what I'm all about. I don't treat people this way. I am ashamed, I really am ashamed of myself, Gatti said."

He acknowledged he is addressing problems in his life.

"This was seriously a wakeup call," Gatti said.

He went on to apologize to his friends and family, and the UConn student body.

At the end of the video, Gatti speaks to those who have offered to donate mac and cheese to him, he instead asked that they donate it to a local food pantry.

"There's a lot of hungry people out there," he said.

Gatti was due in court on Tuesday, but the case has been continued to Nov. 3.

Meanwhile, another UConn student started a GoFundMe page that has raised $2,000 so far to treat the dining staff to dinner in light of the incident. UConn said that university staff aren't allowed to accept gifts. They're working with the fundraising organizer to figure out what they'll do with the money and how to recognize the service of the dining staff.

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