Shake Shack said it has suspended some employees in Washington, DC, pending an investigation into an attack outside the Dupont Circle restaurant.

The incident was captured on cell phone video outside the restaurant on Saturday, showing several Shake Shack employees beating up a customer.

Christian Dingus, the man at the center of the matter, says it started from within.

“We went to Shake Shack in Dupont, me, a few friends and my partner, and we waited in line for about 45 minutes for our food,” Dingus said.

He said he asked where the food was and that he felt the response from an employee was aggressive.

He says his partner took him aside. Dingus says it was an attempt to defuse the situation.

“And then he kissed me, and then another employee came and said, ‘Hey, you can’t do that here,’ and when he separated us, I just wanted to walk away,” Dingus said. “I just didn’t want to deal with it.”

And he says he thought that was the end of it.

When his partner expressed his disapproval of what had happened, a worker escorted him out the side door “and continued the confrontation outside as if he were facing a wall.”

Dingus says he then went outside.

He says he stepped between his partner and the worker, another attempt to defuse the situation.

“At that moment, immediately and without a second’s hesitation, the worker turned on me and started attacking me,” Dingus said. “I think there were two or three other workers there at that point and they tackled me to the ground. I didn’t fight back at all, but immediately went into a kind of fetal position to protect myself.”

He says he can’t remember how long the fight lasted, but he does remember someone breaking it up and seeing a police vehicle nearby.

“They got involved after the fact,” Dingus said. “I stood up and looked at them as if to say, ‘So what’s going on? What should we do?'”

They took information from Dingus and from people at the Shake Shack. No one was arrested.

They asked him if he wanted to go to the hospital, which he eventually did.

A spokesperson for Shake Shack sent News4 the following statement:

“We are aware of the incident on Saturday, August 17 involving Team Members and a guest at our Dupont Circle location and are taking it very seriously. At Shake Shack, the safety and well-being of our guests and Team Members is our top priority and we have a zero-tolerance policy toward any form of violence. We are fully cooperating with local authorities in their investigation and have suspended the Team Members involved pending further investigation. We are committed to taking appropriate action based on the findings.”

Dingus told NBC News that police took his phone to review the video. Washington DC police told News4 that the report on the incident was still being processed.

And as for Dingus, the bruises are still there, as is the pain – partly emotional.

“If we were a heterosexual couple, we probably wouldn’t have been separated for kissing in the back of the restaurant,” he said.