Alex Thomas
A Maryland liquor store owner is facing criticism after a customer says that the clerk went too far when he tackled and handcuffed him until police arrived.
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In the August video, Jay Kim is seen physically engaging with a customer. He tackles Nathaniel Davis after the Davis knocks down a display. But Davis claims that the video doesn’t tell the whole story and that he was actually helping a woman who was in an argument with a cashier, WTTG reports. Another video also surfaced of Kim chasing down a suspected trespasser with police. Now a petition is circulating to close down Largo Liquors; since being posted in mid-October, over 5,800 people have put their names on the Change.org document.
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A former Maryland state’s attorney told WTTG that while citizen’s arrests are legal, they are discouraged. Citizens who arrest the wrong person or employ excessive force can face legal retribution. Those behind the petition are hoping to lobby the city to shut down the store, but there’s no indication yet that it will happen. When WTTG sent a reporter to get a comment from Kim, he was escorted out of the store by an off-duty cop.
A number of people have also left comments on the petition, complaining that they have been banned from the store fr what they say were misunderstandings. One woman said that when she “commented on how expensive an item was,” a worker called the police. Several people wrote that the clerks were “rude.”
