Is it illegal to impersonate a restaurant inspector? What the law says
Last week, the state’s agriculture department warned restaurant owners that a recent viral video trend was leading to a rise in people posing as health inspectors to gain access to restaurants for social media content.
The trend has largely revolved around social media influencers convincing a restaurant owner that they’re visiting the eatery to conduct a health inspection and then subsequently filming it and posting the content online. The state’s agriculture department said Thursday that health inspectors will take photos during inspections, but not take video.
While there is no state law that specifically addresses impersonating a restaurant inspector, there is one against impersonating a public employee, S.C. Department of Agriculture spokesperson Eva Moore told The State.
A section of SC’s code of laws which regulates criminal offenses against public policy means that it’s “unlawful for a person to impersonate a state or local official or employee or a law enforcement officer in connection with a sham legal process.” The move can be treated as a misdemeanor, the law says.
“Because impersonating a government official is a criminal offense, we would ultimately refer any alleged impersonation to law enforcement,” Moore said.
The agriculture department, which oversees more than 25,000 routine inspections of South Carolina restaurants, cafeterias and coffee shops every year, has an online complaint form which allows restaurant owners to report people posing as restaurant inspectors.
Moore told The State that the department had been made aware of a handful of fake inspection videos taken in South Carolina restaurants and warned business owners in a Facebook post last week.
