Safeway calls police on black woman giving food to homeless man

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Employees at a Bay Area Safeway called the police on a woman and accused her of shoplifting.

The woman, Erika Martin, was giving food to a homeless man outside of the store, never stepping foot inside the Safeway, according to San Francisco CBS-affiliate KPIX.

Martin told the news outlet that she thinks the employees called the cops on her because she is black.
"Racism still exists," she said.

Martin said she often spends time making care packages for homeless people in the area, and has given to the man outside the Safeway in the past. On the Sunday evening in question, she was giving him food for his dog when multiple officers approached her.

"The police just blocks me in. I'm like, 'what's going on?" she told KPIX. "Then [the officer] was like, 'Well, we were called here because you fit the description of someone taking items out of Safeway and bringing it back to your car.'"

Martin said that her son, who had gone into the store to see if the deli was offering cookie samples, was "crying because he thought they were there to arrest him."

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/safeway-calls-police-on-black-woman-giving-food-to-homeless-man/ar-BBLnLdt?li=BBnb7Kz

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. Racism is epidemic in our society. We have a long way to go to get rid of this evil thing. n/t

[Hortensis]

7. Which society is it not? I'm fond of accounts from

people who've actually visited the far and remote corners of world. There is no place where people are not people and where some are not really, really, really bigoted against "others." Friends who've traveled many nations won't return to India out of fear of aggressive antagonism she especially encountered on the streets.

At least most people who look "different" aren't in real, immediate, grave danger of being attacked, robbed, and even murdered in Safeway parking lots.

This is a contemptible event, but this woman is not dead, in intensive care, or even in a jail cell, and she may well be able to pay her son's way through college with an inevitable settlement should she accept it. And whoever called the police is in trouble. Stores have cameras which provides defenses for people charged with shoplifting, or just being charitable, while black.

[NBachers]

2. I live in the Bay Area - anyone know which Safeway this was?

[lunasun]

4. In mountain view

Racist store shit is never good for any POC involved

Martin said the questioning scared her son and he started crying while talking to one of the officers.

He told her that when the children asked for cookies the woman at the bakery counter told him that "We don't have anymore cookies to give to you," Martin said. He said they looked behind the counter and saw that there were cookies back there.

The officer asked if they had taken any cookies and he said no.

The police were not called about a cookie
but the kid thought the police were accusing him
He probably already felt bad the bakery women wouldn't give him the free bakery cookie and he could see she was lying


"During the initial dispatch call, a Safeway employee informed our dispatcher that both employees and customers believed a man and a woman as well as children were working together to try and take items from the store," Nelson said

https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area/woman-says-mountain-view-safeway-called-police-on-her-while-helping-homeless-man/1341434546

[lpbk2713]

3. No apology yet from Safeway corporate.

And she sure as hell won't get one from the police until the story goes viral.
Then they will be slobbering all over themselves with apologies.

[LandOfHopeAndDreams]

5. Police Don't Make Mistakes, Nor Do They Apologize

They probably wouldn't apologize if they had shot her, so I doubt this will cause them to do so.

At best, they'll give some excuses, or place blame elsewhere. Perhaps they'll all share a good laugh about how they scared the kid who thought they were being arrested.

[displacedtexan]

6. We have half a dozen regulars at our Safeway in the Inner Richmond neighborhood.

Shoppers regularly buy an extra loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, fruit and a gallon of milk for them. The homeless almost always share with each other. We also give them our cans and bottles so they can get the deposit $.

I don't know much about Mountain View, but When you read "Bay Area," don't assume this stuff is happening inside San Francisco. We're not perfect, and there is crime, but most ofhe bad stuff you read about is outside the city.

This is just my two cents worth, y'all.