Well, it’s Monday: Thanksgiving break is over and we’re all back to work. Many of us spent the long weekend putting ourselves into food comas and shopping for holiday gifts. As hard as it is to admit, there’s something fun about going out to the stores on Black Friday and being a part of the craziness — but often, things get out-of-hand.
Several Black Friday horror stories have surfaced in the last couple of days, but this one is especially shocking. A woman used a stun gun on another in Philadelphia’s Franklin Mills Mall.
The incident happened at about 2:30AM. Before the stun gun was used, the two women were fighting and punching each other.
Mike Napolitano, a witness to the event, said, “It started out, one couple was fighting with another couple. They had words, the guys got into a fight and then the girls. One couple, they were like a family and all, with a young child in a stroller… One girl just brought out a taser.”
Napolitano recorded the incident and put it online. He continued, “Then security came over and I kinda left, you know, I was thinking, ‘God forbid if somebody has a gun or something.'”
The mall’s manager, John Ahle, said, “An isolated incident occurred in the early morning hours between two female shoppers, that was quickly stopped by our security team, and both women were escorted out of the mall. e are committed to the safety of our shoppers, retailers and employees and will not tolerate this unacceptable behavior.”
The stun gun happening wasn’t the only example of “unacceptable behavior” to happen on Black Friday. Several other events around the country resulted in arrests, injuries, and even a shooting.
When Black Friday turns violent, as it did in the Franklin Mills Mall, it seems that something must be done to curtail such behavior. How can violence be prevented without infringing on retailers’ ability to promote and sell — or without putting an armed cop on every corner?
