We have been following the growing menace of flash mob attacks on stores where teenagers descend on a store, trash its interior, and steal merchandise — only to vanish with the arrival of police. However, in the case of a trashed Macon Wal-Mart, police say that they not only have videotapes of the mob but one of its leaders, Kharron Nathan Green, 17, who made the mistake of returning to retrieve his cellphone.
In a flash mob case, the cellphone is critical evidence of course. In this case, the mob hit the Wal-Mart late at night with four dozen people, including people flashing gang signs. Teens attacked a man on a motorized shopping cart and did $2000 damage.
Green is identified in the surveillance video as leading a mob of teens in the planned attack. However, he denied any knowledge at the police station until his parents arrived and were shown the videotape. He then admitted his involvement but refused to name anyone else. However, with the phone and the identification of the leader, police have much more than they usually have in such cases. The question is how hard the Macon police will push to prosecute the other teenagers. This is a crime that is growing due to the lack of deterrence through prosecutions.
As for Green, his lack of cooperation on naming other culprits could seriously undermine an effort to plead guilty for a lower sentence. The phone itself is now likely to be introduced as evidence of a premeditated act of rioting.
The choice of a second degree charge on property damage is interesting. Here is the code provision:
1st Degree Criminal Damage to Property
You could be charged with criminal damage to property in the 1st degree if the prosecution has probable cause to believe you did one of the following:
1. Knowingly and without authority interfered with property in a way to endanger human life, or
2. Knowingly and without authority and by use of force or violence interfered with the operation of any public communication or transportation system, sewer, drainage, water supply, gas, or other public utility.
First degree criminal damage to property is a felony and carries a potential sentence of 1 to 10 years in prison.
Ref: O.C.G.A. §16-7-22
Given the attack on the shopper, it is possible to claim the first criteria, but police may have concluded that Green was not directly involved in that attack and the second criteria does not appear relevant.
Green is now charged with inciting a riot and second-degree damage to property.
I have a suggestion for the store owners in Dellwood and places like the one in the story here. You already spend money on video cameras. Build some trap doors in the floor. Have a huge bin underneath full of dead thorn bushes. Fifteen feet deep bins. Have an alarm system so that some owner or manager at home can turn on the video screen and watch the action in the store. Push a button and the trap door opens and down go some criminals. Close the trap door. Turn on the laughing gas. Call the police.
Has ‘teens’ become a new synonym for black thugs? Almost all of these flash mob attacks involve young blacks, by no means all of whom are actual teenagers. There is a very serious social problem in that segment of the population and euphemisms are used to hide it.
What would a merchant have done 125 years ago?
At 17, he’s a legal minor, and his parents are responsible for any damages. I’ll bet they’re less than happy with what he did. Some might even assist the prosecution. They can’t know what he does all day, or who his friends are, cell phone or not. They’re still liable, sad to say.
bam bam:
There are two Walmarts within a similar driving distance from my town. When I first moved here, I was shopping with my young son at Walmart chatting with the checker about the upcoming Black Friday sale, and which Walmart had the better selection. She told me in no uncertain terms to stay far away from either Walmart, but especially the other one, on Black Friday. She said there are mobs every single year, people get punched, and someone was shot one year by some gang member. I took her caution to heart and have never gone there on any big sale day, and sure enough, have read about violence on Black Friday.
So this kind of violence and destruction can permanently chase customers away.
I am more interested in sociological studies examining what goes wrong in a family to produce kids who engage in self destructive criminal behavior, and apply those lessons learned to the community to try to head off other kids from going down a similar road, than in enabling flash mob participants to get away with this without consequence.
Let’s just say that, instead of Walmart, this is a small business. Your store has been absolutely ruined. Some of it will be covered by insurance, but you have to pay a deductible, your premium goes up, your staff quit because they’re scared, and you lose many days of income because you have to close, clean up the store, and find the money to buy more merchandise. Will your customers feel safe returning? Will you have to hire an expensive security guard?
And let’s say that people were clamoring that nothing happen to the kids because punishment would not be helpful to them.
Flash mobs are extremely popular because it’s hard to catch the perpetrators. If you don’t make an example of them when you do catch them, they obviously keep doing it.
The criminal system is about justice for the victims, deterring others from committing crimes, and giving criminals a time out away from the society they harm. If prisoners reform, that’s super, and I support programs that try to teach the errors of their ways, but that’s not the purpose of the criminal justice system.
Teens robbing and trashing a store, flashing gang signs, attacking a man on a motorized shopping cart who presumably had a medical condition . . . if we are to believe people like the mayor of Baltimore, kids like these are not criminals, they are just youth expressing their anger at the system and we are all racist for picking on them.
There is no way any of us kids would have gotten involved in such a crime. We would have been more in dread of my father’s reaction than the police. There was the sense that bad behavior would shame the family. And attacking a man on a shopping cart for the handicapped is cowardly and dishonorable.
These kids are a reflection of how they are being raised. They cause thousands of dollars in damage to a store and then probably bemoan there not being enough jobs in their neighborhood. Because people should be flocking to open stores with their own savings in a town where flash mobs will wreck them, right? The store and the injured man should sue the parents of every perpetrator they can find. Maybe then parents will take this seriously and impress on their kids not to do this.
It must be incredibly painful to realize your teenager has gone off the rails and is on the path to jail or an early death. Don’t these kids realize we have enough young men in jail already? The guys on the inside want out, but kids like these seem over eager to get locked up in a cage. I do not understand that. They don’t like following the rules so they try their hardest to get locked up where they’ll be told what to do every minute of the day??? Or maybe they think they’ll be the rare exception who doesn’t get caught? Are these kids basically raised by their friends, caring more about peer pressure than parents, because they didn’t have a stable family life and an involved mom and dad? What went wrong to produce a kid who would attack a handicapped man? These kids need to realize what they are doing to their families.
I have no idea what the parenting situation is with these kids. We do know that divorce and single motherhood is skyrocketing, and the statically undisputed fact that kids of single mothers are exponentially more at risk for doing drugs, crime, joining gangs, going to jail, or dying young. They don’t get obstacles thrown in their way from birth; they get mountains. Whether or not any of these kids are the product of a single mother, actions like these are a warning to young girls with stars in their eyes romanticizing what it will be like starting an early family all on their own.
Nick: I read the comments above and did not spot any Liberals who support the punk in the photo and in the article.
If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a thousand times, we need cell phone control laws! Like maybe criminal background checks before getting a cell phone and having to wait 48 hours before being handed the cell phone.
99guspuppet
You want a positive outcome? Well, how about this–how about holding all of us, regardless of race or privilege, to the same standard of justice and not continually giving passes to those considered underprivileged and disenfranchised among us? How about sending a message to any others, who may be contemplating whether or not to engage in such destructive and dangerous behavior, that these actions will undoubtedly result in being prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, including the loss of freedom for committing such wanton and dangerous acts? How about sending a message that in a civilized society we don’t engage in such conduct? That lip service has to be met with consequences. You confuse childish pranks, like TPing a house, with this type of outrageous and criminal behavior. I enjoy shopping at my local Wal-Mart, and I expect to shop there without encountering a pack of wild animals rampaging through the store–destroying it, stealing merchandise and assaulting handicapped individuals on motorized scooters. You see, I’m greedy like that.
You misunderstand my comments …… I do not condone Green’s actions…. please please please explain to me how your suggested actions will reduce destructive behaviour like Green’s. I just don’t get how charging Green with lots of crimes makes our lives safer or more peaceful. I would like to understand how bigger and bigger punishments lead to positive outcomes for you and me…. ( who I presume are relatively benevolent toward others … we don’t steal , we don’t resort to violence, we are kind and generous ) Violence by proxy is still violence that you are committing. If you designate someone else to administer the violence… it still comes from you. Rather than talk about how many charges can be laid on Green ….. tell me what you would suggest doing to him ? Beat him ? Lock him in a room and for how long ? Cut off his hands ? Put him on a penal island such as Australia once was ? I am not being sarcastic…. I really want to know what you think will work. Gus in Denver
Prison time for this dude with the tude. Such anger and attitude needs to be arrested early. Of course, placing him in the care, custody and control of the prison industrial complex and hard core law enforcement might corrupt him forever. Maybe he needs some church time!
Please explain to me , bam bam …………………… what happens when you throw the book at Green ? Does it result in positive outcomes ? Or is it simply that throwing the book at someone …. “feels good” ?
Green has already been “bad”. Now how do “we” deal with it in a way that maximizes good outcomes and minimizes the bad outcomes ?
There are some liberals here who are saying to themselves, “It’s just poor black children trying to get what white kids have, and it’s only Walmart.” I wonder if any will have the stones to write it.
Where is a charge relating to the theft of merchandise? Guess this boy scout is going to get a pass on that. Wonder why? No 1st Degree Criminal Damage to Property charge? He easily meets the first element of the felony. What about a charge of conspiracy to commit a felony? He planned this attack–organized it. Could it be that this pack of animals won’t be prosecuted to the fullest extent because it consisted of black teens, who are considered to be the terminal victims in our horribly racist society, deserving of room to destroy? An attack on an obviously handicapped individual on a motorized cart? No charges relating to that, even though this thug organized the mob? The failure to fully prosecute these mutants for ALL possible charges will only serve to embolden them, along with others who witness the ineptitude on the part of authorities, to continue this insanity. After all, the world watched as the police, in places like Ferguson and Baltimore, stood idly by as cities were looted and burned. A need to combat police brutality? How about a need to combat the all too common failure to fully prosecute the criminals among us?
I don’t support what Green did. It makes me wonder about people who support the US Military , the people who desire heavy punishment for minor crimes, the desire to hold parents responsible for a 17 year old.
When I was 17…. I did not require my parents permission to do whatever I planned for the day. Some of the things I chose to do would have me incarcerated if done in 2015. In 1967 , I skated by. I prefer 1967.
Not involved in the attack. I’m puzzled. He organizes the mob to trash the store and steal merchandise during which the victim was attacked. Sounds like he was involved to me.
The continued hero worship of violent gangs who break the rules and claim they can because of their grievances leads many teens to think everything is ok for them. It’s not and that should be made clear.
There’s tom foolery and then there’s simple mayhem. The kid should be charged to the max and if he doesn’t cooperate nail him some more. What’s next the ‘flash home invasion’? The parents might be included to pay for damages. Something missed in the old parenting department here.
Reblogged this on BLOGGING BAD ~ What Folks Are Saying/Thinking!…Gunny G….
He looks remorseful.