About one year ago, WalMart employees attempted to unlock the doors of a Long Island store at 5 o’clock a.m. on Friday, November 28th, otherwise known as Black Friday.But as the doors were unlocked and many anxious customers made their way to the clearances, employee, Jdimytai Damour, 34, was shoved to the ground and was painfully stomped on and crushed to death by customers barging through the doors.
At the time, Bruce Both, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 1500, the state of New York’s largest grocery worker’s
union said, “This incident was avoidable. This is not just tragic; it rises to a level of blatant irresponsibility by Wal-Mart.”
And it is true, this incident could have definitely been avoidable. It is such a tragic loss. But looking back on that day, has WalMart done anything different to ensure that this wouldn’t happen on Black Friday, 2009?
Wal-Mart Stores said on Wednesday November 11th, that its locations will stay open for more than 24 hours starting on Thanksgiving Day and will put into affect crowd-control measures on the holiday weekend to avoid any repeat of last year’s calamity. It is said that lineups would begin early in the morning to ensure that there were no large crowds for those in search of the 5 a.m. sales.
“Wal-Mart also said it has incorporated into its nationwide planning for Black Friday some of the crowd management strategies negotiated with the Nassau County district attorney’s office last May after last year’s trampling death of Jdimytai Damour,” (http://searchwarp.com/swa556173-Black-Friday-2009-Wal-Mart-Revisiting-The-Black-Friday-2008-Stampede-Death.htm).
As of this moment, I have not heard of any deaths from this years Black Friday shopping (2009). If you have heard differently, I would love if you could post a comment and let me know! Thanks!
