Watch: Gang of Youths Lay Siege to Texas Restaurant, Reportedly Over Candy Sales
A group of youths allegedly laid siege to a Plano, Texas, restaurant on Thursday, seriously injuring a manager — and the argument transpired because the eatery wouldn’t let kids sell candy bars on the premises, police say.
According to WFAA-TV, the incident occurred at a Hooters outlet on Central Expressway in the Dallas-Fort Worth suburb.
The children were reportedly angry because no one was buying the candy and they’d been asked to leave by managers — but they began throwing stuff around on their way to the door.
“They were being escorted out and causing issues according to the detectives. Turning over chairs, throwing things,” said Detective Jerry Minton of the Plano Police Department, according to KDFW-TV.
That wasn’t the end of it, though: The kids then went out to a waiting car and three adult males came out.
The adults proceeded to attack both the manager and a customer trying to help — and a Hooters waitress and customer who were caught in the middle of the fracas barely managed to escape.
Flying glass also cut bystanders after an attacker threw an ash tray through a restaurant window.
The incident was caught on video:
WARNING: The following video contains graphic language and violence that some viewers will find offensive.
PSA IF ANYBODY KNOWS THESE PEOPLE PLEASE CALL PLANO POLICE DEPARTMENT!!!!!!!! THEY DONT DESERVE TO GET AWAY WITH THIS!!! HAPPENED AT HOOTERS IN PLANO!!!!
Reason: this is all over a chocolate bar pic.twitter.com/azRDMcZQ9I— $hyda (@sshydaryder) October 7, 2022
The worst injuries were sustained by the manager, who was left with a broken arm and head injuries.
“At some point the manager was hit by some sort of hard object and broke his arm by one of the assailants,” Minton said.
In addition, a waitress was left with cuts on her face.
At the end of the attack, the group took off, leaving their chocolate bars on the floor — but not before one of the children taunted a waitress, calling her a “b****.”
Police commended the manager and bystander for keeping the violence outside the restaurant.
“It looked like they were trying to do everything they could to keep the assault from occurring inside the restaurant,” Minton told KDFW .
Plano police arrived after the mob left, but are working to identify potential suspects based on the video of the incident. As of Monday, no arrests had been made.
Manager Waldo Montano told WFAA he wants the attackers tracked down and held to account.
“It all escalated so quickly — it was out of my control,” the manager said in a Monday interview. “I didn’t think kicking these kids out would end up with me getting hit in the head with a steel bar or getting beaten up.”
“They’ve come in several times since I’ve been working there for over a year,” Montano added. “Solicitation is not allowed — I was pushing them out, and they started wrecking the place up.”
“I saw so many people coming at me, so I just covered my head as best as I could,” Montano said. “I felt fear — like genuine fear. I didn’t know what to do. I was in the corner until I realized I had to get out of there.”
While it remains unclear why kicking kids out of a restaurant for selling chocolate bars would provoke such a violent reaction, such unapproved candy solicitation by kids is often part of a scam run by organized criminals.
In 2008, ABC News’ Elizabeth Leamy said while “[t]hese kids often claim they’re peddling candy so they won’t have to peddle drugs,” it’s an organized racket that involved roughly “50,000 children nationwide.”
“These children are often poor, and they’re bused in to sell to you. The U.S. Department of Labor says it’s being exploited by greedy adults,” she reported.
“Crooked adults called candy crew leaders run these candy rings. The two crew leaders I investigated both had criminal records. One man had been arrested for battery, possession of heroin and receiving stolen property. The other had spent two years in prison for firearms violations and also had convictions for cruelty to animals, drug dealing and shoplifting.”
It’s not clear from reports, however, whether there was any organized aspect to last week’s event involving the kids’ candy-selling and the subsequent siege. What we do know is that this is yet another violent datum to add to the ugly pile of crime data America has racked up since the turbulence of 2020.
In September, USA Today reported that a survey by the Major Cities Chiefs Association found that violent crime had jumped 4.4 percent in 2022 compared to 2021 — and crime in 2021 was already much higher than it was before the pandemic.
In many cities, smash-and-grab robberies have become an epidemic. Videos of these robberies — along with other criminal activity — have become a common sight on social media, and the statistics show it’s not just because of the ubiquity of smartphone cameras in 2022.
Crime has been a major issue in the midterms, and for good reason: America knows this needs to change. Pushy kids selling candy bars isn’t anything new, as ABC News’ 2008 report indicates. A store manager getting pummeled for kicking them out is, however — and behavior like this is enabled by soft-on-crime defund-the-police Democrats.
Voters ought to remember this violent clip — and so many others — when they’re in the voting booth come next month.
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