The entitlement mentality on display

Food stamp glitch sparks legal looting at Walmart

Walmart’s shelves were cleared in two cities after a software malfunction cleared spending limits from cards for two hours.

Shoppers  in Mansfield and Springhill, Louisiana, cleared shelves as they filled shopping carts to overflowing, CBS affiliate KSLA reported.

Springhill Police Chief Will Lynd said they were called in to help the employees at Walmart because there were so many people clearing the shelves. The Walmart Supercenter Mansfield shelves were cleared in two hours.

“It was worse than anything we had ever seen in this town,” Lynd said. “There was no food left on any of the shelves, and no meat left. The grocery part of Walmart was totally decimated.”

“I saw people drag out eight to ten grocery carts.” One person hauled away more than $700 worth of groceries, Lynd added.

Mansfield’s Chief of Police Gary Hobbs said customers were only “pushing and shoving” with reports that customers were checking out with six to eight shopping carts.

The glitch was caused by a power outage during a routine maintenance test by Xerox of their government-funded EBT debit cards. Electronic Benefits Transfer cards allow recipients of government food stamps to purchase items under a preset limit.

“We did make the decision to confine to accept EBT cards during the outage so that they could get food for their families,” said Walmart spokeswoman Kayla Whaling. Other stores did not.

From 7pm to 9pm on Saturday, people loaded up their trolleys but at 9pm the spending limits on cards were being shown. One woman was detained because she rang up a bill of $700 and only had .49 left on her card. She was held by police until corporate Walmart said they would not press charges if she left the food.

“Just about everything is gone, I’ve never seen it in that condition,” said Mansfield Walmart customer Anthony Fuller.

The stores made a record of all transactions and managers were investigating how to proceed, she said.

Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services’ spokesman Trey Williams said retailers who chose not to use the emergency procedures that limit sales up to $50 per cardholder during an emergency would be responsible for any additional amount spent over eligible benefit balances.

One shopper O J Evans said the chaos was a normal reaction to the prospect of free food but Stan Garcia, another shopper, said it was just plain theft. “That’s stealing,” he said. “That’s all I got to say about it.”