Safeway calls cops on black mother for giving food to the homeless because they thought she was a

[workinclasszero]

shoplifter

Tana Ganeva 31 JUL 2018 AT 10:48 ET

Altruism can now be added to the list of benign activities black people apparently can’t engage in without being treated like criminals.

Sunnyvale, California resident Erika Martin says she and her family liked to give food and other supplies to the homeless, KPIX reports.

“It makes me feel good, you know,” Martin told the station.

On a Sunday in July, she was sitting in her car, waiting to give a homeless man who spends his time in a Safeway parking lot some dog food for his pet.

All of the sudden, multiple officers approached her car. Safeway employees had called the police because they thought she’d been shoplifting.

https://www.rawstory.com/2018/07/watch-safeway-calls-cops-black-mother-giving-food-homeless-thought-shoplifter/

[yardwork]

1. This is why we can't have nice things.

America will never be great until we let go of the racism. Apparently too many of us cling to it like a security blanket.

Message to my fellow white Americans: put down the racism. It will be all right. Honest.

[lillypaddle]

2. So sick of this shit

WTF is the matter with people?

[msongs]

3. article does not provide info that incident is racially biased nt

[moriah]

5. I have almost no pigment, except freckles. NEVER had to deal with being falsely...

... accused of shoplifting, they rarely check my ID for anything (even checks), been questioned about why I was in my neighborhood, hell, never even been asked for permission to search a vehicle I was in despite carrying pot most of my misspent youth.

Let alone been accused of shoplifting because a kid with me wanted to see samples.

I can't help but think there MIGHT be a reason I haven't experienced these things and so many PoC I know have.

[matt819]

8. Sure, it was an honest mistake

The store probably calls the police on possible white shoplifters all the time.

Did the police go into the store to talk to a manager first? Did they look at any video? Did they ascertain the facts, or even collect basic information, before they accosted this woman?

This is outrageous.

[peabody]

11. I'm not defending Safeway here

but they do call the cops on white people too. When I was doing my computer training for the Safeway in Campbell, California, the room where the computer was was where they took people who shoplifted and were being held until the police arrived. On that day, they caught a white, young man stealing a bunch of packaged meats: a whole tote bag’s worth. They held him until the cops came. Once there, they wrote him some sort of violation and then released him, but not before the manager said that he was now banned from the store.

[aeromanKC]

14. Of course that was after he actually shoplifted.

The other incidents being reported recently of shopping while black there have been no violations committed.

[LakeArenal]

16. I am Nordic white. I have been stopped on suspicion.

But it’s the one thing I’m in the minority. I know many more people of color are stopped. I was stopped once in my life.
Because my coat was completely buttoned up to my neck in the winter.
More people are stopped for being people than for buttons.

[peabody]

18. Yes, that's true.

During my time at Safeway, I had a feeling that thief was rampant and that the managers where under a lot of pressure to stop losing merchandise. Of course that doesn’t excuse them in this case. To me, with all the cameras in the stores and the fact that if you did anything to make corporate unhappy would result in a transfer or a firing, a store manager would check twice before doing what they did here.

[LanternWaste]

9. Nor does the article imply the food was edible.

But it would take a rather biased mind to allege "the food might not have been edible. We don't have evidence it was..."

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Note to all people of color: always have your receipts handy.

[Harker]

10. At the thrift store where I work

there are plenty of people who want a bag and a receipt because they "don't want anyone to think (they're) stealing", even though the door is five feet away and I'm the only employee on the sales floor.

Sad.

[ProfessorGAC]

6. Really?

Because a little kid asks if there are free cookies (he's a kid, remember) they suspected shoplifting.

Then, the cops didn't do anything until she gave a bag of dog food to a homeless guy? If they thought she had been shoplifting, what the heck were they waiting for?

Sounds to me they were more targeting the giving stuff to the homeless than they were worried about shoplifting.

And if i heard the store was trying to discourage those "icky" homeless people from hanging around in the parking lot, so they called the cops to look for some excuse, i would not be surprised.

[Flaleftist]

15. That makes sense.

I have worked retail in the past and have seen similar things. Some customers are uncomfortable going to stores where "icky" people may be around, stores will do everything they can to discourage it.

[ProfessorGAC]

17. Yeah, I Suppose

But why hassle someone who gave dog food to some guy. A shoplifter stole stuff and then went outside to give away the stolen goods in the parking lot of the store?
That doesn't make sense.

[heaven05]

7. typical becky BS

just won't leave black people alone. Trumpers and evil people, one in the same.

[OldManTarHeel]

12. Good Lord . .

Please forgive me to even ask what has this world become . . ?

[marble falls]

13. Poop.