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The story gets even more disgusting:
The real reason companies do this is to make an example out of someone to other employees. It's shitty and fucked. They absolutely could have even with the write-up or termination but they have to make everything super serious because management is always on a power trip at the store level.
15 years ago when I was working for Best Buy this happened with a cashier/service rep eating bags of snacks from boxes destined for the shelves. During a meeting where he wasn't present management let us know it was happening, told us the plan to wait til it was well over $100 total so they could have him arrested, and told us that if anyone told him to stop they'd be written up. They didn't want him to stop, they wanted an example to make.
Even at the time I thought it was weird we couldn't stop him. I saw him later eating a snack that week and felt a tug to say something but fear of losing my income, my ability to pay rent and for food, held my tongue. Part of me felt like it was "get him" but I think that was solely a defense mechanism for fear of losing my job.
Fuck every one of those managers, and every one here too.
This was a year ago. Why did it reappear all over the net again now?
It sounds like the police body cam footage was recently released, thus the resurgence of the story
No, it was out a year ago
Okay, the article literally says
“Although James’ arrest occurred a year ago, bodycam police footage was only recently released.”
Which is why it’s being discussed again
He stole food over a period of months. I'm not sure the company was in the wrong here since they had a person stealing from them. And they waited months for it to stop before arresting him since he clearly wasn't able to stop himself and it wasn't an isolated incident. What did the thief do to earn redemption?
Had Meijer simply fired James upon discovering he had taken food, the company might have avoided intense backlash. What sparked the online furor is that Meijer’s managers allegedly waited months for James to surpass $100 in theft so they could call the police and have him arrested.
This is common practice. Pizza Hut manager was skimming from the cash register. They waited several months before having the police come in and charge him for over $1000 in theft.
Skimming cash is a hell of a lot different than food being eaten though. Cash can go to anything. Food just goes to the toilet.
NAL This makes them (the store) intelligible to try and recoup costs in civil court due to the responsibility of the plaintiff to minimize damages.
I understand the option to prosecute the guy but what isn't talked about is if Meijer tried to work with him and gave him second/third/etc chance by saying "hey, we saw. Let's figure out what's happening"
I literally worked with a manager in grocery who did this with people and got mixed results but he still tried. 3 people turned around out of a dozen or so who eventually quit. There was one guy, I'll call him Ryan, who would eat yogurt and huff whip cream gas whenever he got the chance. After 6 months of hell he was finally hauled off after being found passed out in the dairy case. Probably from the whipped cream.
I was a bagger and so was Ryan. I had to work twice as much for those 6 months because he was so bad as an employee.
Lemmy doesn't see the second chances. They only get the end result. And folks sure are excited to shit on someone when they are swayed by clearly biased writing. I don't like corporations as much as y'all but the company didn't make the guy steal. It wasn't entrapment. They solved a problem. What steps did they take before the police? No idea. But the article also manipulated folks into thinking he was special needs when it was just a guess by the author. It's fucking lunacy that someone can ask a question about any missing details not provided by the article and have so many down votes based on believing the propaganda.
You god damn mother fucking idiot. You clearly read the whole article and saw the part about how instead of stopping him when caught they deliberately waited months until he passed the threshold so they could legally fuck up his entire life.
I’d take a thousand hungry people stealing food over one of you pieces of shit.
Yeah. I guess I am an idiot. I thought the store manager or one of the key holders was delaying any punishment because they were trying to give the guy a second chance or some kind of opportunity to avoid repeat offending. Second chances look a lot like this.
But yeah, I'm an idiot for being hopeful someone should act immediately and just fire him.
The issue here is not that the kid got in trouble - he should have. The issue is that they waited for months, with full knowledge of what he was doing, so that they could have him arrested.
He shouldn’t have gotten in trouble, he should have been spoken to and supported.
The kid was hungry not stealing millions.
The dude was special needs and eating food out of the trash... And he was 16. They set him up for an arrest rather than just fire home over fucking nothing.
The article author self diagnosed the guy as special needs - it was an unsupported guess about the guy without evidence. Just looking at him and expecting a stereotype. I'm not here to assume and am taking the article details as provided.
Profiling based on appearance is wrong. All the details from the article are that the guy was stealing and then corporations are bad for not letting him go.
I found the shill
Yeah, I'm a shill. Just like all the other shills who come in seeking clarification. Nice way to dog pile. Hope you get the comfort from the group that you clearly need.
And they waited months for it to stop before arresting him since he clearly wasn’t able to stop himself and it wasn’t an isolated incident.
This is incoherent. Why wouldn't they just fire him after the first incident?
Or the second, or the third.
I mean it'd be a pattern after a week. No indication the kid was stopping.
Nah, any person who wasn't specifically seeking an arrest would've intervened, firing him, writing him up, literally anything, before resorting to calling the police.
They're shit people.
I worked in grocery and had a manager who actually hired at-risk and untrustworthy people because he believed in second chances. I saw 3 people get caught red handed and then coached back to being reliable and professional this way. Actual humanity means taking time with people - which I thought might be happening here. But nope, fuck me for asking questions.
I was hopeful that folks were kind. I didn't even need to read the article to see how unkind people are to others. These comments are enough to kill hope.
this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2025
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