Steak A La Pube

FEBRUARY 28--It's every diner's nightmare: You've somehow offended a restaurant employee who then decides to exact a little revenge by placing something unpleasant in your grub. That's what cops say happened Saturday night at the Texas Roadhouse in West Bend, Wisconsin, where Kevin Hansen dined with family and friends.

It seems that the trouble began when Hansen mentioned to a manager that his steak was 'a little over done.' While Hansen said that the meal was still okay, the manager, Michael Liberatore, insisted that he accept a new medium rare steak (which Hansen took and brought home with him).

When he decided to eat the steak the following day, Hansen spotted what looked like pubic hairs 'stuffed in the middle of the steak.' A subsequent police probe resulted in the arrest of Ryan Kropp, a 24-year-old cook who admitted adding 'at least two of his facial hairs' to the steak, according to a criminal complaint.

Kropp, pictured in his mug shot, claimed that he defiled the ribeye because he thought Hansen was 'just trying to get free stuff' by claiming the steak had been overcooked. Another Texas Roadhouse worker, Michael Perkins, told investigators that after Kropp cooked the replacement steak, he remarked, 'These are my pubes' as he used his fingers to stuff something into the steak. 'Fucking bastard, made me cook a whole new steak,' Perkins recalled Kropp saying.

As to the true source of the hairs, Liberatore told cops that he recalled Kropp not having 'more than a couple days worth of facial hair on his face' Saturday evening.

Kropp, who bonded out of jail Wednesday, is facing a felony charge of placing foreign objects in edibles, which carries a maximum of 42 months in prison. (3 pages)