A 7-year-old boy was wrongly accused of stealing a package of cookies from a candy store located in the East Zone of São Paulo. “I didn’t steal anything,” the boy declared, who faced the accusation of the manager of the establishment while standing in line at the checkout, accompanied by his parents.
According to the criteria of
The incident, which occurred last Thursday, August 22, was recorded on a video that quickly went viral on social media.
The merchant Giovanna Santos has reported the store manager for racism against his sona case that has generated great public outrage.
The boy was singled out as a shoplifting suspect by a store employee in the presence of other customers and employees. The boy’s mother, Giovanna Santos de Oliveira Brasil, 25, recorded her son’s statement as he cried, in a moment of great distress.
The video, which shows the dialogue between the child and his mother, has generated a strong reaction on social media.
Images from the store’s security cameras, although without sound, capture the moment when the employee approaches the child and his parents while they were waiting in line at the checkout at Magic Doces, a store in Cidade Tiradentes.
🚨Veja: “I don’t eat anything,” says a constricted black boy, 7 years old, unjustly accused by the manager of a local shop in the Eastern Zone of São Paulo of eating a package of unpaid balls pic.twitter.com/P6fjmdF5xC
— Parallel News (@NP__Oficial) August 29, 2024
The unfounded accusation
When he approached the family, the worker claimed that the boy’s alleged theft had been captured by the store’s security cameras. However, The recordings do not support this claim.as the store itself later acknowledged in a statement.
The family had purchased more than R$ 500 (363,970 Colombian pesos) worth of candy. The boy had had his birthday two days earlier, and his parents had promised him a celebration with candy for the weekend. That’s why they went to Magic Doces. “I won’t go back to that place,” said the mother.
The name of the manager was not disclosed by the company. The woman reported to the Civil Police, who, however, He registered the incident only as “slander” at the 44th Police Delegation (DP), Guaianazes.
Consulted by ‘g1’ and ‘TV Globo’, the Secretariat of Public Security (SSP) reported that the Police will review the videos and that, as the investigation progresses, the nature of the crime could change.
“The reported incident was recorded at the 44th Police Station and is being investigated by the 54th Police Station (Cidade Tiradentes), which is in charge of the area. The police authority will take statements from those involved and examine the recordings in order to clarify the circumstances of the incident.
It should be noted that the initial classification of the The complaint is not final and may be altered as the investigation progresses.“, the SSP statement said.
“I’m sure you didn’t do anything wrong, honey. I know… Mommy knows you didn’t do anything wrong. Mommy knows the son she raised well, you know?” Giovanna tells her son, emotionally, in the video. “You don’t have to be scared, okay? Mommy is here with you, okay?”
This dialogue between the child, whose identity will remain confidential in this article, and His mother, who appears crying in the recording, was shared on Instagram and TikTok.
“The manager told me, ‘We saw on the cameras your son taking the cookies, eating them and hiding the empty package behind the shelves,'” Giovanna recounted what she said she heard from the Magic Doces employee.
“We asked to see the pictures. The employee went to look at them and when I came back and asked him about the pictures, he said that unfortunately there were no pictures, that there had been a mistake, and he apologized,” said the boy’s mother, who replied to the manager: ‘We’re the only black people here in line, and you just walked up to us‘, he added.
After this, he said he took out his mobile phone and started recording. “We are living a moment of humiliation and racism. We have never experienced anything like this. We have experienced discriminatory looks, but reaching the point of being publicly accused has never happened to us. If he had had the decency to approach us in a more discreet way… But he already came with the accusation.”
The mother’s purpose in recording what happened was to denounce what her lawyer, José Luiz de Oliveira Júnior, described as “distrust based solely on racial motives.” She said she plans to go to court Police Station for Racial Crimes and Crimes of Intolerance (Decradi) so that the case can be investigated further.
“It is a branch specialised in investigating crimes related to racism,” explained José Luiz. According to him, the Oliveira Jr & Santos Advogados law firm is also considering filing a claim for moral damages against Magic Doces.
“The company is responsible for having employees with such behaviour. The solution is to take those who commit acts of racism to court.”
Through a statement published on its social media account, Magic Doces admitted that the worker made a mistake by accusing the child without foundation and said that he is investigating the situationThe company also said it “does not tolerate, under any circumstances, discriminatory or prejudiced behavior.”
“An incident occurred in our store involving a minor, who was confronted by an employee on suspicion of having consumed a product without paying for it. In light of this, we reviewed the security recordings and, after an exhaustive analysis, the incident was not confirmed,” Magic Doces said.
Lawyer rejects accusations of racism and theft
In a phone call, lawyer Alexandre Aivazoglou, who represents Magic Doces, sent two videos from the store’s security cameras to ‘g1’ and He said the footage shows the manager’s interaction with the family was “calm and respectful.”
“The recordings at the store show that the manager, in a polite and courteous manner, approached the child’s father and asked him if the minor had entered with the bag of cookies from outside or if he had consumed them inside the store,” the lawyer explained. “The situation did not occur as the mother has presented it.”
Alexandre also called it “ridiculous” to accuse the manager of racism. According to him, Magic Doces “employs a black person, and most of their customers are also black.”
“At no point did the manager accuse the child of theft,” Alexandre noted. Since this statement differs from the note issued by Magic Doces, The media consulted the lawyer about the company’s official version. To which he replied:
“When the issue broke out on social media, the company tried to provide an explanation, but it did not use the right words,” the lawyer said.
WILLIAN RAFAEL.
G1.
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*This content was created with the assistance of artificial intelligence, based on information from O Globo Brasil (GDA). It was reviewed by a journalist and an editor.
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