According to New York Post
The Florida Costco shopper who went ballistic after an elderly woman asked him to put on a face mask said he refused because he’s “claustrophobic” and has trouble wearing one, according to a report.
Speaking for the first time since the viral video emerged, Daniel Maples — who lost his job at an insurance firm over the outburst — said the face covering causes him “distress,” according to the Fort Myers News-Press.
“After a while, I start to feel like I’m suffocating. I get claustrophobic and that’s an issue for me,” Maples said. “I prefer not to wear the mask. It’s something that causes me a lot of distress.”
Maples — who said he’s received hundreds of threatening texts, emails and voicemails since the June 27 incident — denied shouting at an elderly woman, saying his anger was directed at other shoppers.
“I remember someone saying something to me about ‘I have cancer, I have cancer.’ I replied, ‘Well, my father died of cancer,’” he said. “I didn’t understand why she was yelling at me about that.”
He added, “I never yelled at an old lady.”
Tense unrecorded interactions with other folks in the store — including people who confronted him for not wearing a mask — led up to the confrontation and made him feel threatened, he said.
“It was like the mob was gathering around me and I felt threatened,” Maples said. “In that moment, I was scared. I’m not a fighter, I’m not a person that deals with this on a daily basis,” he said. “I don’t know how to manage this.”