Violence erupted overnight during Black Friday shopping as at least 24 people were injured in a series of incidents, including seven at Walmart stores in the U.S.
The violence included a California shopper who was shot during a failed robbery attempt, a fight over $1.88 towels, a police officer who used pepper spray to quell a crowd, and a pepper-spraying shopper who injured 20 people in her haste to keep other people away from the merchandise she wanted to buy.
Among the incidents:
In Los Angeles, authorities said a woman shot pepper spray to keep shoppers from merchandise she wanted during a Black Friday sale, and 20 people suffered minor injuries.
The incident occurred shortly after 10:20 p.m. Thursday in a crowded Walmart as shoppers hungry for deals were let inside the store.
Police said the suspect shot the pepper spray when the coverings over electronics items she wanted were removed.
“Somehow she was trying to use it to gain an upper hand,” police Lt. Abel Parga told The Associated Press early today.
Parga said police were still looking for the woman. The store remained open and those not affected by the pepper spray continued shopping.
In Florence, Ala., a shopper was subdued with a stun gun at a Walmart store as shoppers gathered for Black Friday sales.
WAFF-TV reports police said they used a stun gun twice to gain control of 22-year-old Christopher Blake Pyron before arresting him.
Police said they made the arrest around 11 p.m. Thursday, about an hour after the Alabama Walmart opened its doors for late-night and early-morning shopping. Authorities said he is charged with public intoxication, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.
In Northern California, authorities said a Black Friday shopper is in critical but stable condition after being shot by armed robbers outside a Walmart store.
San Leandro police Sgt. Mike Sobek says the victim and his family were walking to their car around 1:45 a.m. when they were confronted by a group of men who demanded their purchases. When the family refused, a fight broke out and one of the robbers shot the man.
Sobek says other family members wrestled down one of the suspects, who was taken into police custody.
Investigators are reviewing store surveillance video to identify at least three other suspects.
Witnesses say the Walmart parking lot was crowded with Black Friday shoppers at the time, and the store was briefly closed as police investigated.
In North Carolina, one man was arrested after a holiday shopping scuffle at a Walmart store in Kinston which police quelled with pepper spray.
Public Safety Director Bill Johnson says the incident happened early Friday. An off-duty Kinston officer was working a security detail for the store when some customers began trying to get electronic equipment that wasn’t yet available for purchase.
Johnson says the off-duty officer used a short burst of pepper spray in the air to control the scene. Johnson says no one was sprayed in the face or eyes.
One man was arrested, but information on the charges he is facing was not immediately available.
Shopper Angel Bunting told WITN-TV that the incident began when a man waiting in line for discounted cell phones fell into a display.
In central Florida, a man is behind bars after a fight broke out at a jewelry counter during Black Friday.
Kissimmee, Fla., police tell the Orlando Sentinel that two men were fighting at a Walmart store during Friday’s early hours. One man resisted when a police officer tried to escort him out of the store. Officers had to force him to the ground to put him in handcuffs.
The unidentified man is charged with resisting arrest. No shoppers were hurt.
In the Toledo suburb of Oregon, police responded to three separate reports of fighting at a Walmart on Thursday night. One officer told The Blade newspaper that one of the fights was over towels selling for $1.88.
In upstate New York, police said two women were injured and a man charged after a fight broke out at a Walmart.
In Colorado, a bomb threat today prompted the evacuation of employees and customers of a Woodland Park Walmart for about four hours as police and federal agents checked for explosive devices but found none.
Woodland Park police dispatch supervisor Karen Glenn says the threat arrived around 8:30 a.m. CST today during one of the busiest shopping days of the holiday season. Police from Colorado Springs as well as agents with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Bureau responded.
A check of the store that included the use of a bomb sniffing dog found nothing.
Glenn said officials declared the store safe around 11:30 a.m. and were planned allow employees back inside around noon.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. officials did not immediately return a message.
In non-violent shopping related Walmart news, in northern Ohio, Black Friday shoppers had to leave their bargains behind when a car accident knocked out power, forcing the store to be evacuated.
A driver hit a utility pole near the store just before midnight near the town of Port Clinton, along Lake Erie.
Authorities from around the area including police, firefighters and agents from the U.S. Customs & Border Patrol were called in to get hundreds of Black Friday shoppers out of the Walmart.
The State Highway Patrol says the driver who caused the blackout had been drinking and was arrested.
