PHOENIX -- Police in the Phoenix suburb of Buckeye are coming under fire for a video posted online Friday that shows a grandfather unconscious on the floor of a Walmart with a bloody face after police said he was caught trying to shoplift.

The video shows 54-year-old Jerald Allen Newman unconscious and covered in blood after a police officer took him to the ground Thursday night.

Officers in the video are shown trying to sop up blood as outraged customers yell expletives and say, "That's police brutality," and "He wasn't doing anything."

The man's wife and other witnesses say that Newman was trying to help his young grandson after the boy was trampled by shoppers, and only put a video game in his waistband to free his hands to help the boy.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/11/25/arizona-grandfather-roughed-up-by-police-in-walmart/#ixzz1elIduqrr

$hit happens. He was probably stealing the game to sell for drugs.

That is pretty far from what happened, he was there with his grandson and the boy was getting trampled by the crowd so he placed the game in his waist band to free both hands to get the boy out of the crowd. As far as stealing from walmart goes I wish everyone would do it, maybe run them out of business which would be good.

That is pretty far from what happened, he was there with his grandson and the boy was getting trampled by the crowd so he placed the game in his waist band to free both hands to get the boy out of the crowd. As far as stealing from walmart goes I wish everyone would do it, maybe run them out of business which would be good.

I had an incident today at Wally World with Loss Prevention people, so it's not like they are psychics.

I bought 4 items, one of them a DVD box set with the usual embedded loss prevention device. When the cashier was scanning the items, she missed that fact that it didn't ring, but it DID make the loud sound saying the tag had been neutralized. When the total came to far less than it should have been, I said "Wait-- something's wrong here, the total should be a LOT more than this. Are you sure the DVD's rang?" She said "I think so, it made the sound." I asked, "Please check."

Without acknowledging my honestly, she did, found the mistake and gave me the new total, which I paid.

When I went to leave the store, I suspect one of the Loss Prevention people noticed the exchange and naturally suspected I was up to no good. They wanted to see all the contents of the bag and the receipt, which I was still carrying with the change. You could tell by the body English that they thought I was up to something.

I can only imagine what would have happened had I not been paying attention, either. Never mind that the DVDs didn't trigger the alarm because the tag had been deactivated or that it was the cashier's mistake-- Fox News would probably have reported that I was carrying a neutralizing device in my other shoulder holster.

Or teleported it into the bag after I left the cash register.

-Kerry O. "To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail."

PHOENIX – Police in suburban Buckeye were under fire Friday when a video was posted online showing a grandfather on the floor of a Walmart store with a bloody face after police said he was subdued trying to shoplift during a chaotic rush for discounted video games.

The video, posted on YouTube, shows 54-year-old Jerald Allen Newman unconscious and covered in blood after a police officer took him to the ground Thursday night.


Officers in the video are shown trying to sop up blood as outraged customers yell expletives and say "that's police brutality" and "he wasn't doing anything."

"Are you sure that was necessary for shoplifting?" said one shopper. "Why would you throw him down so hard?"

In a police report that redacted the names of officers and witnesses, Newman's wife and other witnesses said he was just trying to help his grandson after the boy was trampled by shoppers, and only put a video game in his waistband to free his hands to help the boy.

Larry Hall, assistant chief of Buckeye police, said Newman was resisting arrest and it appeared the officer acted within reason.

Hall did not immediately release the name of the officer, who was hired off-duty by Walmart with five other officers to deal with the large crowd the store anticipated.

Hall said a Walmart employee alerted the officer involved that Newman had put a video game in his waistband, and that the officer approached Newman and started to arrest him.

When he had handcuffs on one of Newman's wrists, Hall said Newman told the officer, "I'm not going to jail," and started pulling away and flailing.

Hall said Newman continued resisting and the officer decided to do a leg sweep and take him to the ground.

"Unfortunately, the suspect landed on his head," Hall said.

The officer involved wrote in the police report that he yelled at Newman to "stop resisting!" before deciding to take him to the ground.

"The store was incredibly crowded, and I was concerned about other customers' safety and possibly getting involved," he wrote. "I then utilized a leg sweep with my right leg as I pulled down with my arms to take Jerald to the ground to better affect the arrest and protect the other shoppers."

The report said that Newman's grandson was treated and released for his injuries by firefighters at the scene.

Hall said an administrative review will be conducted to assess the officer's use of force, but it appeared to be justified.

"The officer didn't lift the guy over his head and slam him to the ground," Hall said. "He used a minimum amount of force, the suspect resisted arrest, and the officer actually could have escalated his use of force. But he didn't. He used his hands to take the suspect into custody."

An ambulance took Newman to the hospital, where he got four stitches for a cut on the left side of his forehead. His nose was also bloodied but not broken, Hall said.

Newman was then booked into the Maricopa County jail on suspicion of shoplifting and resisting arrest.

The police report describes a chaotic scene around a discounted video game stand at the Walmart as customers were made to wait until a 10 p.m. release.

About 200 people surrounded the stand and inched closer and closer despite officers warning them to stay back.

"I observed the crowd rush in and attack the cardboard displays with video games flying through the air and the cardboard displays being thrown around and broken completely down flat on the ground," one officer wrote in the report.

Another officer described seeing a man get trampled and helping him to safety, while another officer saw a woman walking away from the stand with a young girl who was crying and holding her mouth in pain.

One customer reported that people yanked three video games from his hands, leaving him empty-handed.

One witness told police that he saw Newman put a game under his shirt and try to get his grandson out of the area, but Newman appeared to just be trying to get to safety without someone grabbing the video game out of his hands.

Police found Newman's 8- or 9-year-old grandson crying after the incident and turned him over to his grandmother, who police described as hysterical.

"The wife was so upset and told me Jerald was just trying to protect his grandson that got trampled in the crowd and just placed a video game under his shirt while grabbing his grandson to get out of the crowd," wrote one officer.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/11/25/arizona-grandfather-roughed-up-by-police-in-walmart/#ixzz1elhTaZu7

The statement that several people heard about not going to jail or back to jail AND resisting just helps the cop. If the guy was for s ome reason in the right he should have just cooperated, got a ticket and fight it in court.

the ****ing cops are out of control

the ****ing cops are out of control

the ****ing cops are out of control

what I wonder is why they weren't doing their jobs? If people were grabbing merchandise out of the hands of strangers & video games were flying everywhere, methinks they should have been paying more attention to that type of crowd control so that grandpa could carry the game in his hands and his grandson could walk in safety - the real issue is that the job of keeping a controlled environment was not done

and how could they?

every year on black fiday, people are out of control and people get hurt, or dead..

once again, money is more important than people

IDK - perhaps limiting the number of people in the facility - I don;t necessarily have the answer to that - -but certainly it needs to happen - and it is their responsibility to keep control - so really the same people who are in charge are actually the ones who failed by not creating an appropriate safe environment

I am sure this grandpa was not shoplifting and is a victim of these unprofessional mall cops or store security whatever term you prefer.

I will look forward to the real facts comeing out on this, Icant imagine a grandfather useing his grand kid to steal a discounted video game. Seems pretty absurd.

I agree, the greedy store owners need to limit the crowds.
Even so, face down hard enough to bust your face open seems extreme to me.

what I wonder is why they weren't doing their jobs? If people were grabbing merchandise out of the hands of strangers & video games were flying everywhere, methinks they should have been paying more attention to that type of crowd control so that grandpa could carry the game in his hands and his grandson could walk in safety - the real issue is that the job of keeping a controlled environment was not done

and how could they?

every year on black fiday, people are out of control and people get hurt, or dead..

once again, money is more important than people