Lisbel Rodríguez Luna, a 25-year-old cashier, was violently attacked by several women at her workplace, a supermarket in the Bronx (NYC).
The attackers captured in the dramatic video were a woman and her unidentified adult daughters, according to New York Post.
Rodriguez was left bruised, battered and in fear for her life in the Sunday afternoon attack at the Food Universe supermarket in Fordham Manor that reportedly stemmed from an argument over paying for recyclable bottles a week earlier.
“I have to work. I need money. I need my job. I do not know what else to do”
Lisbel Rodríguez Luna, cashier attacked in the supermarket
“Nobody ever attacked me like that,” Rodríguez said the next day, adding that she is terrified to go back to work there because her attackers are still on the loose and may come back. But “I have to go back,” she said. “I have to work. I need money. I need my job. I do not know what else to do”.
Surveillance footage captured several women breaking in and beating the clerk at her cash register, while other store workers desperately tried to separate them.
Recovering at her home, Rodríguez explained that she had first encountered the main assailant the week before when she skipped the checkout line to collect cash in exchange for returning recyclable materials.
“She said, ‘Bit… You better give me my money… I’m going to kick your ass. I’ll kill you. I’m going to bring my girls and we’re all going to kick your ass!’ I gave her the money, about $15” dollars, she reminded herself. She “was terrified.”
Store manager Jose Minaya said he stopped the irate woman outside the store when she returned Sunday and tried to defuse the situation. He even took Rodriguez to a deli counter at the back of the bodega to hide for about 10 minutes and wait for the belligerent customer to leave.
“But the woman waited outside,” Minaya said. “You can see her here in the video of her waiting outside, calling her daughters and then her daughters came. There were three daughters and another older woman, so there were five in total. The women “met outside” and then “came in and immediately attacked,” she said.
The incident is under investigation, an NYPD spokesman said Monday. No arrests have been made. Anyone with information should call 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) and in Spanish 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). Also through crimestoppers.nypdonline.org or by text to 274637 (CRIMES), followed by TIP577. All communications are strictly confidential.
In a statement, the advocacy group Collective Action to Protect Our Stores (CAPS-NY), which represents nearly 4,000 stores, including supermarkets and bodegas in the New York metropolitan area, said politicians they must do more to protect workers.
Shoplifting in New York is at an all-time high, including violent attacks on employees and owners who have clashed with shoplifters and homeless people. But many of the detainees flee and, if they are caught, they are soon released thanks to penal reform, victims and NYPD officers complain.
Last week a 79-year-old employee was hit in the head with a gun during a robbery at a jewelry store in Queens (NYC).