A fight broke out at the Porter Ranch, California Wal-Mart store on Black Friday 2011, leaving twenty people, including children, injured by pepper spray, CBS News is reporting. A woman customer used the pepper spray against other shoppers shortly before 10 pm on Thanksgiving night. Many customers hit by the pepper spray were waiting to buy Xbox gaming consoles and Wii video games.
One of the hit customers, Alejandra Seminario, said she waiting in line to buy toys. She heard a commotion in the next aisle, as people began taking of the plastic encasing of gaming consoles. She said people started screaming and pushing each other right before the entire area filled with pepper spray.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department’s Wes Elder confirmed the attack, saying that a customer did deploy the pepper spray while inside the Wal-Mart. He also confirmed that the 20 fellow shoppers were briefly exposed to the spray.
One of the shoppers hit, Cesar Seminario, who went to the discount department store for a Wii console, said the air still smelled of the spray when she was paying. “We saw five people that were in really bad shape. They had been sprayed in the face…they had swelling of the face….redness, coughing,” she added.
Wal-Mart later took statements from the customers who had been hit. Several customers, including Joseph Poulose, who was exposed to the spray near the DVD and video games display, blamed the incident on the store for failing in crowd control.
Written by: Karen Benardello
