Teen arrested in Wal-Mart racial case

Saturday, March 20, 2010

A 16-year-old boy has been arrested after he hijacked the Washington Township, New Jersey Wal-Mart's public announcement system to make racial comments. The boy was arrested Friday night and then released into his parents' custody. He was charged with harassment as a bias crime.

The boy, whose name was not released, faces up to a year in a youth detention center if convicted. Police say that they are not sure if the incident was planned or improvised, although they say it does not affect the case against the boy.

Witnesses say that on March 14 they heard a male voice announce, "Attention Wal-Mart Customers: All black people, leave the store now!" The store's manager quickly made an apology, followed by Wal-Mart's headquarters. Police say that they did not record anyone making the announcement, although they do have a video of three persons, including the suspect, standing near the voice intercom telephone around the time of the incident.

"We are just as appalled by this incident as our customers," Wal-Mart said in a statement. "Whoever did this is just wrong and acted in an inappropriate manner. Clearly, this is completely unacceptable to us and to our customers." The incident is unrelated to the February 2009 lawsuit which claimed that Wal-Mart underpaid black workers.

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Sources

Kirk Semple. "Arrest in Racial Case at N.J. Wal-Mart" — New York Times, March 20, 2010
Larry McShane. "Arrest made over 'all black people leave' announcement at New Jersey Walmart" — New York Daily News, March 20, 2010
Bruce Shipkowski. "Black people must leave, NJ Walmart announcer says" — The Associated Press, March 18, 2010

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Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.