vc318

I wish I could say that people were better behaved for those Day After Thanksgiving sales but not very likely for a few people:

Wal-Mart worker dies in rush; two killed at toy store - CNN.com

Wal-Mart worker dies in rush; two killed at toy store

(CNN) -- Three violent deaths in two stores marred the opening of the Christmas shopping season Friday.
A Wal-Mart employee at this Long Island location was killed in a rush early Friday morning.

In the first, a temporary Wal-Mart employee was trampled to death in a rush of thousands of early morning shoppers as he and other employees attempted to unlock the doors of a Long Island, New York, store at 5 a.m., police said.

In the second, unrelated incident, two men were shot dead in a Toys "R" Us in Palm Desert, California, after they argued in the store, police said.

The toy company and authorities said the California shootings had nothing to do with shopping on Black Friday, which is historically one of the year's busiest shopping days.

The Wal-Mart worker, whom authorities did not identify, was 34 and lived in Queens, said Nassau County police Detective Lt. Michael Fleming.

"This was utter chaos as these men tried to open the door this morning," Fleming said.

Video showed as many as a dozen people knocked to the floor in the stampede of people trying to get into the Wal-Mart store, Fleming said.

The employee was "stepped on by hundreds of people" as other workers attempted to fight their way through the crowd, Fleming said.

"Several minutes" passed before others were able to clear space around the man and attempt to render aid. Police arrived, and "as they were giving first aid, those police officers were also jostled and pushed," he said.

"Shoppers ... were on a full-out run into the store," he said.

The crowd had begun forming outside the store by 9 p.m. Thursday, Fleming said. By 5 a.m. Friday, when the doors were unlocked, there were 2,000 or so shoppers, many of whom "surged forward," breaking the doors, he said.

The man was taken by ambulance to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Others in the crowd sustained minor injuries such as sprained ankles, Fleming said.

A 28-year-old pregnant woman was taken to a hospital, but "the baby is going to be OK," Fleming said. She was to be released later in the day, he said.

The California shootings occurred about 11:30 a.m. (2:30 p.m. ET), authorities said.

By the time police arrived, two men were dead from gunshot wounds, Riverside County sheriff's Sgt. Dennis Gutierrez said. He said authorities are not seeking any other suspects.

Gutierrez said that the men did not appear to be store employees and that the dispute appeared unrelated to shopping.

"There was a confrontation inside of the store. But over a toy? I don't think that is accurate," he said.

Two handguns were found near the men's bodies, Gutierrez said.

In a written statement, Toys "R" Us spokeswoman Kathleen Waugh said the shooting appeared unrelated to the heavy shopping day.

"Our understanding is that this act seems to have been the result of a personal dispute between the individuals involved," she said.

She said company officials were "outraged" by the shooting and were working with authorities to find out what happened.

Gutierrez said no one else in the store was injured. Gutierrez said no one else in the store was injured. The store remained closed Friday afternoon but was expected to open as usual Saturday. Video Watch police confirm two people dead at a Toys 'R' Us store »

He said authorities would not release the men's names until their families have been notified.

Daniel Watson said he was at home with his children when his wife called from the Toys "R" Us store, where she and her mother were shopping.

"All I could hear was gunshots in the back," he said. "She said, 'They're in here shooting.' I told her to run and hide, stay down and hide."

He said his wife did just that, ducking under a clothes rack until the threat was over. Watson said neither woman was hurt.

Asked about the possibility of criminal charges in the Wal-Mart death, Fleming said he would not rule it out but noted that charges would be "very difficult," as it would be "almost impossible" to identify people in the crowd from the video, and those in the front of the crowd were pushed by those behind them.

Hundreds of people may have lined up in an orderly fashion but got caught up in the rush, he said.

Wal-Mart spokesman Kelly Cheeseman issued a statement saying, "We are saddened to report that a gentleman who was working for a temporary agency on our behalf died at the store and a few other customers were injured. Our thoughts and prayers are with their families at this difficult time."

The company is investigating the incident, the statement said.

Officers patrolling the shopping center overnight had had concerns about the size of the crowd, Fleming said, and had tried to get those in line better organized. Wal-Mart security officers were also present overnight, but he said he did not know how many.

"I don't know what it's worth to Wal-Mart or to any of these stores that run these sales events," Fleming said, "but it has become common knowledge that large crowds do gather on the Friday after Thanksgiving in response to these sales and in an effort to do their holiday shopping at the cheapest prices.
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"I think it is incumbent upon the commercial establishments to recognize that this has the potential to occur at any store. Today, it happened to be Wal-Mart. It could have been any other store where hundreds and hundreds of people gather."

Asked whether the security had been adequate, Fleming said, "In light of the outcome, in hindsight, the answer is obviously no. ... This crowd was out of control."

This goes on all the time so why don't these stores have better measures put in place like having the police present or something. This really could've been avoided.

Bella Grint

This is why I hate Wal Mart...well, maybe not being fair there but their stuff isn't worth it..prices and quality don't balance damnit! And Black Friday is now on the hate list too as if it wasn't already.

sm_love_dc

My God! A death because you needed to shop, REALLY!! That is the worst thing ever.

fetch

Rushing to be first in a store is important enough to hurt people? If this isn't a sign about how commercialism hurts us, I don't know what is.

JJ4EVER

Source



Um... DUH.

Bella Grint

Yeah..ditto Leila.

vc318

So true.

I'm going to merge the threads, if that's okay?

Pacey'sgirl

This angered me and saddened me! I mean a family will be without a father, son, brother and husband this xmas all to save a few bucks! Unreal! Its the worst tragedy is so shamefull! those sales need to be banned everywhere IMO! God bless that family and my prayers go out to them.....I hope some folks learned a lesson from this. Have a great day all!

vc318

Someone said it right on another site that had the same story - if Walmart and others like them would just make the effort to keep shelves stocked of these hot items and offer them all day instead of during a certain set of hours then there wouldn't be incidents like these.

Do you guys think the ones who trampled this man should be charged?

sunnykerr

Unless the man responsible for this poor employee's death went at him with a shovel or something, then I don't see how he could be held responsible. No more than any of the thousands of people who were out shopping that day. It was an accident. A horrendous, tragic, deep-thinking-inducing, must-reconsider-our-priorities accident.

And not to make light of this tragedy, but this is the first time in my life that I've been grateful for my dad's obnoxious attachment to celebrating his birthday on the actual day of his birth, i.e. December 26th, every year. I've always thought he was being a total baby about it. I still think that, in large part. But, my God, I've been dreaming about the Boxing Day specials for years now... but if it's like that, then I'll stay home with my very own version of Ebezener Scrooge, thank you very much.

ceilirose

They'll never be able to charge the people who broke down the doors and trampled on this man but Wal Mart can and should be held responsible for negligence in crowd control. In my industry you don't let 1000 people descend on the buffet dinner line all at once because it would be pure chaos. It's the same concept here - no one had an overall idea of what was or could happen.

vc318

Sunny, the Day After Christmas is usually pretty hectic too with everyone returning gifts and taking advantage of those gift cards they got and stuff. And you're right - it's probably safer to stay home this year.

Hey Susan. Walmart should invest in handing out tickets on hot items if they know they don't have an abundant supply. They really acted reckless. Plus, they're having another major sale tomorrow morning. Gee, I hope things don't get out of hand again.

sunnykerr

Or, I don't know, they could expand the specials... to, say, an extra day. I can almost guarantee there would be less violence on the day of if people thought they had more time on their hands. It's a matter of mass apathy, really.

Pacey'sgirl

I dont know about the folks being charged for this....but they sure dont have a clean conscience beings they all continued to trample a man to death not one person stopped to help....*shrugs*

sunnykerr

Oh, but that happens every fricking day. I'm not saying it makes it right, but people walk by people in distress, in imminent danger and in the middle of various kinds of crisis every single day. You don't see us suing them. It sucks, but it happens.