A 20-year-old woman took FamilyMart’s slogan “Make yourself at home at FamilyMart” quite literally when she walked into one of its franchises and started flinging merchandise onto the floor.
The incident, which was captured on video by a customer and uploaded to YouTube, took place on March 8 at a store in Greater Taichung’s Wurih District (烏日).
Police said the woman walked into the store and started throwing items from the refrigerated section onto the floor. After making her way through three shelves, she went to the back of the store and started tossing drinks from the cooler onto the floor.
Photo: Yang Ya-min, Taipei Times
The woman refused to say why she was trashing the store and even threw bottles at the customer who was filming the incident, police said.
“We were shocked and afraid of causing a scene if we tried to stop her,” said the two clerks who were on duty at the time.
Despite security camera footage from the store matching the YouTube video, the manager of the store denied that the incident took place. However, FamilyMart Co said it had turned the matter over to police.
When the police arrived at the scene after receiving reports of a disturbance, the woman had already left, but officers managed to locate her with assistance from eyewitnesses.
By the time police found the woman, she appeared to have calmed down, but remained silent during questioning, letting her husband answer.
Her husband apologized for the incident and agreed to compensate the store for its losses. The store’s representative said a criminal complaint would not be filed.
Police said the woman suffers from bipolar disorder, which likely contributed to her actions.
The woman was being treated for the disorder, but she had not been back to the doctor for several months and had stopped taking her medication, police said.
Additional reporting by Tang Tsai-hsin
Translated by Jake Chung, Staff Writer
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