Florida Walmart calls police on black customers for shopping too slow

[KamaAina]

Nope. Not The Onion.

http://thegrio.com/2015/06/13/florida-walmart-calls-police-on-black-customers-for-shopping-too-slow/

A Walmart in Pensacola Florida in under fire after video surfaced of the police being called on some shoppers who were doing nothing wrong.

When the police showed up, they became aggressive with the shoppers, who were African-American, and asked them to leave. When the group tried to finish up their shopping before they got out, the police thought they were taking too long to leave and arrested one of them.

What’s more, this incident comes on the heels of another recent Walmart video, this one involving two white women.

In the video, two women came to blows, brawling in the aisle of a Walmart as one woman’s 6-year-old son gets involved and begins throwing shampoo. In stark contrast to the Florida shoppers, these women were not arrested and were in fact gone by the time police arrived. Their descriptions were not taken down by security, either.

[bravenak]

1. This shit is like a parody. Tragicomic.

[daleanime]

27. +1

[lpbk2713]

2. WalMart always seems to be in the right when law enforcement gets involved.

Funny how it always works out that way.


No ... not really funny.

[randys1]

3. tick tick tick

most PATIENT

most PEACEFUL

group of human beings EVER

that they have not burned down this entire country by now, wow

[Warpy]

4. Let's hope every POC and white people of conscience avoid this Wal Mart

until and unless those people get a very public apology.

The only language they understand at Wal Mart is a swift kick to the bottom line.

[JanMichael]

5. And people are blasting that woman in Washington for identifying as black.

Hell I think I would too at this point. The difference of those two women fighting on the shampoo aisle for what had to be almost 10 minutes with no interference and calling the cops on people who are shopping "too slow" is sickening.

I'm ready to toss my membership card.

[Ilsa]

6. The Florida panhandle is ripe with RW bigotry

and ignorance.

And even in central FL the anti-choicers spend more money on their insultingly stupid billboards than anywhere I've visited. All of that money could have been used to help new mothers who have had crisis pregnancies.

[me b zola]

19. +1

Central Florida is crazy ignorant, and Florida over-all, has for all intents and purposes, no social services.

There is a private group that operates out of Tampa that helps women in crisis pregnancies but want to parent to parent their child. They help them navigate through whatever services are available, network to find work, babysitting, clothing and other things that new mothers need. Currently they are assisting a married woman who had talked to an adoption agency because she was checking out her options, but then when she changed her mind (before the birth of the child) and decided to parent, the adoption agency demanded she pay them thousands of dollars or they would take legal action against her. The adoption agency's threats were illegal as they were doing everything to pressure and coerce her out of her child (the child would have brought the adoption agency @ least $20,000, possibly upwards of $40,000). My friends in Tampa are assisting with legal matters and every indication is that they will be successful in keeping that family together.

[Ilsa]

25. OMG. Extortion. Figures.

They are selling babies. Disgusting.

[me b zola]

32. Its a billion dollar industry, so there is a $lot$ of motivation to be unethical

This type of coercion is all too common here in the states. In the UK social workers have a quota of babies that they need to place for adoption so they target poor families to take their infants from them, even though they have done nothing wrong. Norway also targets poor women for their children, their only crime is poverty. The third world nations are hot-beds for supplying children to the adoption industry using trickery and sometimes outright kidnapping. Buyer beware, there is a chance that the cute little bundle of joy that you adopted has a fit family that never intended to relinquish their child.

[moondust]

7. Well yeah.

Crime: Not making the rich richer fast enough.

Punishment: Three years of unpaid labor if convicted.

[dixiegrrrrl]

8. Actually, one of those fighting women is in jail on a felony charge from that incident.

" .....a pair of criminal charges, including a felony child neglect count, according to court and jail records."

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/crime/walmart-brawl-arrest-897421

[cwydro]

22. glad to hear this.

That poor kid.

[toddwv]

9. Shopping while black

is a punishable offense. Based on other police responses in Walmart, they're probably lucky that they didn't get shot on sight.

[GreatGazoo]

14. yes. Compare to this group who are allowed to do anything and everything to these cops

They swarm the cops, break their beloved taser and call them Nazis about 200 times:

[toddwv]

20. The police restraint was quite amazing.

They didn't start pulling guns until the cop that gets shot goes down. In this case, the dash cam completely exonerates the cops' reaction to the extremely dangerous situation.

[dembotoz]

10. So if I am way early for an apt and blow some time wandering around a store I am criminal

Why are you in jail???
I was felony early

[nc4bo]

11. Why is the man in the pink shirt riding that buggy?

He doesn't look like he needs the assistance

Get your ass out of there and walk, save the scooter for someone who needs it.

Obviously this was a short clip but these guys look like they were doing more loitering and goofing off than shopping. Is that against Walmart policy? Is there video actually showing them doing something illegal? I guess they looked threatening and up to no good without actually doing anything threatening.

I don't know wth I'm even looking at.

[csziggy]

13. You can't tell from a short clip whether he really needed the scooter

Before I got my knees replaced I could walk OK for short distances but needed a scooter to get around a medium sized store. While I had a temporary handicapped tag people gave me a hard time because my disability was not immediately recognizable. Yes, I could walk - but if I walked more than a couple of hundred feet I had tremendous pain and swelling that night and the next few days.

One of the replies on the YouTube page for the video says something about the man having been in an accident shortly before the incident.

It doesn't matter if the disability is not obviously visible - a person can still need the scooters without their need being obvious.

[nc4bo]

15. Near the end of my Mom's life, she needed the scooter.

It was one of the very last trips I took her on.....and it was to a walmart. Not that it was Walmart's fault (don't know if they use contractors to supply and maintain scooters) but I blamed them for keeping malfunctioning and broken scooters available instead of promptly repairing or at the very least, take malfunctioning ones out of commission. Too often I'd have to play musical scooters with a disabled person.

So seeing that clip burned me a bit. I would see way too many kids at the walmart acting like the scooters were amusement rides.

And, trust me, I understand about hidden handicaps. My Mom needed the placard for parking and although she seemed to be able to get around well, her copd and liver problems made getting handicapped parking spaces a necessity.

[csziggy]

16. I would blame Walmart for not repairing their scooters

Not blame someone who might have a hidden disability! Walmart makes more than enough profit to maintain their equipment and they choose not to.

My Mom is at the point where she really needs her handicap tag - she has a heart valve problem which she has elected at 94 to not have repaired. She also fell a couple of months ago and broke her hip so now she is really unable to get around. But if I took her shopping and a scooter was not available, I would be giving the store management a hard time just before we left to go to another store.

[nc4bo]

18. They blew me off. I was sooooo overwhelmed with her care

That I just couldn't fight one more battle. Beat dog doesn't begin to describe how I felt during those last months.

So yea, I get all that about hidden disabilities, 100 but seeing that brought back all the horrible rough times.

Apologies for going there.

[csziggy]

24. I'm sorry you had to go through that

And I understand completely.

[magical thyme]

12. I don't see anything showing why Walmarts asked them to leave

I don't see anything showing the police becoming aggressive and I didn't hear anything suggesting they were "shopping too slow."

And as noted in another post above, one of the white women in the Walmart brawl was arrested and charged with a felony.

[Takket]

17. .

Oh, but I'm sure white shoppers at Beverly hill boutiques have the cops called on them all the time for shopping too slow!

[romanic]

21. It looks more like they were loitering.

But I dunno.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

29. People can get arrested for "loitering" in a store?

I thought that, as long as you are not being disruptive, not performing unauthorized transactions, and are properly attired, you can usually hang out in stores as long you want- at least until the store closes.

Am I missing something here?

[cwydro]

23. Why do they keep saying "squat" to the cop?

Is that some new insult?

[samsingh]

26. i refuse to shop at walmart. why are these shoppers going there?

[KamaAina]

28. 'Cause they're poor?

'Cause Sprawlmart drove half the other stores in town out of business?

[uponit7771]

30. ...add this to the list ... sigh

[KamaAina]

31. Larry Wilmore has a hilarious segment on the Nightly Show

called "$#*! Black People Can't Do". I guess we can add shopping at Walmart to the list.

[Rex]

33. Wow, last week it was Swimming While Black...now it is Shopping While Black.

WTF!