THUNDER BAY – An incident at the Shoppers Drug Mart at McIntyre Centre shot on a smartphone made its way to social media on Sunday.
The incident shows what appears as a person being arrested and manhandled by a security officer for the store.
NetNewsLedger has not been able to get a recording of the video, but we have seen the video. The video shows a security officer attempting to arrest a person. The video also shows that individual picking up the person and slamming him to the floor.
The incident has officials with Loblaw Companies Limited concerned.
“Shoppers Drug Mart has a no-touch policy, which means pharmacy owners, their store employees and their security partners are not allowed to physically engage with anyone in our stores. This use of force and handcuffs is a clear violation of that policy”.
Catherine Thomas, Senior Director, External Communication, Loblaw Companies Limited tells NetNewsLedger, “This is an absolutely unacceptable incident and we are deeply concerned by what happened. We take the safety of our customers, our pharmacy owners and their employees seriously”.
“Each of our stores work directly with third-party security companies to support those efforts”.
“Shoppers Drug Mart has a no-touch policy, which means pharmacy owners, their store employees and their security partners are not allowed to physically engage with anyone in our stores. This use of force and handcuffs is a clear violation of that policy”.
The parent company says that “Working with our pharmacy owner we have been in contact with the third-party security provider and have recommended disciplinary action – including restricting the security guard from working at any of our stores”.
The incident has sparked a lot of commentary on social media.
Thunder Bay Police are investigating the incident.
Loblaw spokesperson Thomas says, “We sincerely apologize to the family for what happened. It does not reflect our company’s values or customers’ expectations”.
