Source: Reddit
Important background – my mom is paralyzed from the waist down, so my dad and I would take her out grocery shopping every now and then. She had a motorized wheelchair, but it was too bulky to take with us to the store, so we brought her non-motorized (push) wheelchair with us.
Dad would push her around, while I would pull stuff off the shelves she wanted us to get and put them in our cart. One other note – Dad has a voice that he’s used in the past to scare people. Just ask old potential boyfriends of mine.
While doing this, Karen began yelling, “Hey miss?” then whistling, then the dreaded throat clear. I put the last item in the cart and turned and said, “can I help you?” when she thrust a list at me and demanded, “Get me the stuff on my list.” I should note that I look nothing like the employees, they wear blue from head to toe basically, and I was wearing a yellow sundress with daisies on it. I said, “No, I’m helping my mother now, I think there’s an employee at the front desk who can help you.”
She didn’t like this and reached out to grab my arm, saying something like, “You will help me now!” Sorry, no threats of “I will get you fired.” I shoved her away, shouted “NO!” when I felt the blood running down my arm where her nails had broken my skin on my bicep. Dad looked over and kinda freaked when he saw the blood and shouted “Leave my daughter alone!”
Mom was looking at something on her list, but my dad’s voice was loud enough to get an employee to rush over. He asked if there was a problem, and my dad said, “this woman just assaulted my daughter, do you have a first aid kit or something to help her out? I’m going to call the cops while you get this. Upon hearing the word “Cops”, the lady just sunk to the floor crying and trying to say it was just a misunderstanding.
When the cops arrived, I had been bandaged up and the manager had come up and upon listening to my and my dad’s story, as well as the employee describing the aftermath, they went to the back with the manager to check the video. Meanwhile, the lady is crying, saying “I’ll lose my kids.” No “Sorry” or anything like that. The cops arrested her for assault on a minor and took her away crying.
At the trial later, the two things I most remember is that she was on probation and did indeed lose custody of her kids (I think the father got them), And she tried to say “It was an honest mistake, I thought she was an employee.” Whereupon the judge said, “even if she was an employee, what gives you the right to grab someone like this?” while showing her the pictures that were taken of my bloody arn. She broke into more tears as the judge read her sentence, including the loss of her children due to violating her probation, plus some community service, I think. Did we go too far here? What are your opinions?
Much later, as part of her effort to get her children back, she had to write me a letter of apology which is still in my parent’s attic in a box.
What would you do in this situation?
