They don’t call it Black Friday for nothing. A woman in a Los Angeles Walmart hit the store at 10:20 pm to grab the holiday deals only to find other customers rushing toward the items that she wanted. Police say that, as the coverings on the items were removed, she pepper sprayed the other customers. Twenty people were injured.
Police Lt. Abel Parga said that she wanted to get “the upper hand” in grabbing electronics. Police are looking for the woman. Presumably, the area was under surveillance making identification more likely.
Once arrested, the woman may want to call pepper spray expert Fox correspondent Megyn Kelly who insists (in relation to the Davis controversy) that pepper spray is just a food product below:
As part of the holiday gift-giving to personal injury lawyers, tort and criminal cases sprung up across the country with reports of injuries and attacks. Stores can be liable in such cases, which have resulted in actual fatalities. One of the leading authorities in the area of promotional liability is the Weirum v. RKO decision, holding a radio station liable for injuries caused to a third party when teenagers drove recklessly to find The Real Don Steele in his marked van. The court held that the reckless driving was a foreseeable response of teenagers to the promise of free concert tickets.
In the case of a criminal assault, as here, Walmart is on better ground and would likely be vulnerable only in its response to the attack if it showed negligence.
Source: Syracuse
Gene H:
you make me laugh every time you put fingers to your keyboard on economic topics.
If Wal Mart engaged in predatory pricing there would be another store to come in and take business away from them. They compete with themselves to offer the lowest price they can make a profit.
Small mom and pops are the ones who engaged in predatory pricing and when Wal Mart came in the gravy train was over and mom and pop went belly up because they were charging $40 bucks for jeans they got for $10 while Wal Mart was charging $15 for jeans they got for $6.
Sam Waltons model was to get stuff in as cheap as he could and blow it out of the stores for a couple of pennies of profit. Thereby giving the guy working at the local plant a few more bucks in his pocket every month and not in the pocket of the mom and pop shop.
You are no socialist, you are nothing but an apologist for the petite bourgeois.
Here is a clear cut case of mis-use of a product, that intentions was to give a person a means of self defence to ward off an attacker or law enforcement a means to break up out of control gathering’s without having to go to other means of force.
Spoken like somebody who doesn’t understand how economies of scale can be leveraged into anti-competitive business practices like predatory pricing and monopolization of market share. A healthy economy, like a healthy ecosystem, cannot be dominated by apex predators. It needs diversity and competition to thrive.
AY:
When Wal Mart comes to small town America, the guy working at the local burger joint isnt hurt he is helped by lower prices.
The people who are hurt are the small mom and pop’s, the haberdasher or the appliance store. But the haberdasher may sell a pair of jeans for $40 while Wal Mart is selling a pair of equal quality for $15. The construction worker now has $25 more to put in his pocket and spend on something else or put it into his savings account.
I have read articles suggesting Wal Mart is not good for small communities but the thing is, Wal Mart is not putting the appliance store out of business, the consumer is. The consumer is voting with their pocket book. I dont care how much I liked the guy at the mom and pop clothing store, if they were charging me $40 dollars for jeans and I could get similar quality at Wal Mart for $15, I would go to Wal Mart.
I once looked into importing short sleeve knit shirts [Polo shirts] from Pakistan and I could get a container full for a couple of dollars per shirt. That included shipping and customs fees. Are you telling me a mom and pop clothing store couldnt do the same thing? The college town I lived in had a store called Mr. Guys that I liked and they sold pants for $50-$70 per pair back in the 80’s. I bought a couple of pair and one day I was in the store shopping and happened to see the packing slip, the price they paid was like $7.95 each. It was the last time I shopped there. I am all for capitalism and getting the best deal you can, but that cuts both ways and I’ll be damned if I will pay $60 bucks for a pair of pants the owner got for $8.00.
And that is why those small mom and pop stores go out of business, they have been fucking the locals for so long, the locals are fed up.
Geeze Bron,
You think you get superior service at Walmart? I agree with you on the part about the People put Blooms out of business…But at what price? Is it because Walmart has superior bargaining power with Manufactures…or is it because of the altruistic nature of Walmart?
Let me make sure I understand your theory correctly…If prices are the basis of the market driven economy then that is what should control right?
Theory works in Keynesian Economics…Life lives in these American Towns…
people regularly bash Wal Mart for putting other companies out of business as they did with our local Bloom just last night in fact. Bloom had the misfortune of being in a 2 tenant space, one of which was taken over by Wal Mart a few months ago.
Wal Mart offered to buy Bloom out of their lease but Bloom declined and went head to head with Wal Mart. Bloom lost and we as consumers won. Actually Wal Mart didnt put Bloom out of business, we did. The people who chose Wal Mart over Bloom put Bloom out of business. Wal Mart had nothing to do with it. All they did was provide a superior service at a better price. Consumers did the actual dirty work of destroying this particular Bloom.
If consumers choose one business over another, why is that bad? And why should Wal Mart be blamed? They didnt lower their prices nor did they engage in any bashing of Bloom, all they did was put a store next door. Bloom could have increased their efficiency and lowered prices and improved services but they were trying to compete with Wegmans. They made a mistake in their business model and their food quality.
If they were competing with Wegmans, they screwed up. Wegmans is just a little over a mile away and they are still in business, Wal Mart hasnt done anything to Wegman’s market and for a couple of reasons; one, they either purchased or leased and built their own facility in a residential area with no other grocery stores within a mile or so and two, many homes and condos are within walking distance. Wegmans also has prices which are good in respect to the quality of their food. Consumers have supported the decisions Wegmans has taken.
In a free society businesses are free to fail, efficient capital drives out inefficient capital and that is how it should be for the overall health of the herd. It happens on the Serengeti and it should happen on Main Street and it should be made to happen on Wall Street.
If government was in control of the vast herds of Wildebeest, they would, in the end, be a small herd of genetically inferior animals and the once fertile Serengeti would be a vast wasteland.
I feel sorry for the Bloom employees but in a healthy economy they would be hired by better companies who make more efficient use of capital.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=hhPdH3wE0_Y#!
Here is what really happened at Davis. I wonder why we never saw this version of the video?
no food in electronics
some people just can’t seem to follow the rules.
is it wrong to hope a relative of megyn kelly was in the crowd
No doubt following the fine example of that UC college cop who used pepper spray on those peaceful protesters.
Well…Mike S……Something had to stimulate the economy after the war between the states…..
on the lighter side. Here was a wonderful, hilarious response to the police brutality at uc davis:
http://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&hl=en&source=hp&biw=1151&bih=569&q=artwork+of+last+supper+pepper+spray&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2&oq=artwork+of+last+supper+pepper+spray&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=s&gs_upl=1669l8904l0l10456l28l28l0l23l23l0l200l738l2.2.1l5l0
P.S. “Shopping for a x-mas bargain” will be used as mitigation during sentencing!
Mike S, that’s called a “counter-irritant.” It’s the equivalent of hitting your toe with a hammer to cure your headache.
Thank God 1) I moved, 2) I don’t shop at Wal-Mart, and 3) I don’t shop on Black Friday. Until a few months ago, that was my local. I’ve spent many hours in the shops on either side of that exact Wal-Mart.
The country as a whole has become desensitized toward violence. It doesn’t help that the assault at Davis was handled by giving the attacker the equivalent of paid vacation, instead of putting him in jail pending trial for assault with a proscribed chemical weapon, as would have been appropriate.
Will this insanity of Black Friday never end. As a non-Christian, I am offended by the use of the most joyous holiday of Christianity for commercial purposes. When I was young as the Christmas season began,
more like December than after Thanksgiving Dinner, the constant theme was “Peace on Earth, Good Will to All”. Now thanks to the wonders of expensive marketing propaganda, average people find themselves under severe pressure to overspend in order to meet their gift-giving needs. Our consumer society has turned what was a joyous holiday, while I never celebrated it I always loved the good spirits of Christmastime, into a nervewracking experience for those who do celebrate. I can understand what pressures people are under to indulge in extensive gift-giving and as a non-Christian, sympathize strongly with those Christians who decry the commercialization of their sacred holiday.
As for this particular woman I think the common use of pepper spray gives
license to believe it is a minor inconvenience to those sprayed, Two years ago I had a bad case of shingles and the pain was unrelenting and unbearable. I googled and found a medication called Capscacin was the topical treatment for it.This medication uses the same pepper base as pepper spray. I rubbed it on the affected area of my chest and started screaming, because the Capscacin pain made the shingle pain in significant. My wife had to use milk to get it off me and to soothe my skin. Unfortunately for me, I then read the label and found this medication worked by causing a pain worse than the shingles and when its effect wore off the shingle pain would seem insignificant. I can only shudder with that experience, as I imagine what the effect of pepper spray would be to a person. This woman, when caught, should be prosecuted with severity for inflicting this pain in the name of a Christmas bargain.
These damned stores should show more respect for America’s number one secular holiday and at least begin Black Friday at a normal hour, so that their employees can enjoy Thanksgiving with their family and friends.
Probably just following example of UC Davis, violence against non violent to get what you want.
And Jill, you are absolutely, and sadly, right.
The ultimate irony would be if, once found, the woman was a cop or was buying gifts for cops.
On the day of direct action at the Stock Exchange a young, well dressed lackey was trying to get into work. He demanded the police pepper spray the protesters so he could get into work. I’m slightly surprised they didn’t oblige him seeing as the police has decided to, “align themselves with those who openly despise them”. What both show is the terrible contempt people have learned towards their fellow citizens. That people are willing to harm others for financial gain (or for their own self-esteem as when when group reflexively hates another group), takes its form at the highest and lowest levels of our society. We have created a society that encourages cruelty.
We have also created a society which values things. Things are more important than how we treat others.
So to my mind, it is time for real soul searching among our population. Who are we and who do we really want to be? We need to deeply consider these questions. I hope we do not wish to remain the society we are now and that we will create something much deeper, kinder and fulfilling to true human needs.
Where was Lt Pike this morning?