Minneapolis cafe owner hires homeless man asking for money

MINNEAPOLIS (KMSP) - A Minneapolis café owner is gaining national attention for hiring a homeless man who had come into her restaurant asking for money. Cesia Abigail Baires is the owner of Abi’s Café on E. Lake Street. She posted on Facebook about a man named Marcus who came into her cafe asking for money.

Baires said she asked him, “Why don’t you have a job? You know nothing is given to me for free, right?”

Marcus told Baires it was hard for him to find a job because of his criminal record.

“Well, I have a lot of felonies and no one wants to hire me for that, so now I had to turn myself to the streets and get money the only way I know – stealing and asking for money,” Marcus said, according to Baires' Facebook post. 

Instead of throwing him out, Baires, who was short staffed that day, offered Marcus a temporary job at the café.

"I was like Marcus do you want to stay a couple hours, do you want a job? If you want to work I have one for you," Baires told Fox 9. 

Marcus accepted, saying he would “do anything for food.”

"He got so happy," Baires told Fox 9. "That moment, his face, I was just like, you made my heart smile when he made that face." 

Marcus has been working a two-hour shift at the café for the past two weeks, washing dishes and taking out the trash, according to Abigail. He uses some of the money he earns to buy food at the restaurant, she says.

Marcus has since been hired for a permanent part time position at Abi’s Café. 

Abi's Café has been increasingly busy since she posted Marcus’s story online. Baires told Fox 9 she broke down in tears this morning because she was so happy, feeling for the first time that her life is really coming together. 

"People say I'm an angel for him," Baires said. "It's been the other way around."