Several violent incidents broke out across the country amid what have been mostly peaceful Black Friday crowds, as millions of shoppers rushed into stores that opened their doors hours earlier than usual on the most anticipated shopping day of the year.
But tensions on what's typically the biggest shopping day of the year seemed to reach a boiling point at some stores.
Twenty people, including children, were injured when a woman at a San Fernando Valley Walmart store used mace against other customers in what authorities referred to as a "competitive shopping" incident.
Black Friday shoppers pepper-sprayed in Calif.
Other reports of violence during Black Friday shopping include a shooting during an attempted robbery in the parking lot of a Walmart store in San Leandro, near Oakland.
One shooting victim is in critical but stable condition after being accosted by would-be thieves. One of two suspects was detained by the victim's family and arrested. Police are searching for a second man.
Shooting outside Calif. Walmart, 1 wounded
There were also reports of gunfire at Cross Creek Mall in Fayetteville, N.C. According to CBS Affiliate WRAL, shots were fired outside the mall near the food court entrance around 2 a.m. One suspect ran inside the mall, and a second followed him, firing more shots. No one was reported injured. Shoppers left the mall and some smaller stores closed in the wake of the shooting. Police say they're looking for two suspects.
CBS Affiliate WTVH reports several fights broke out in the electronics department of a Walmart store in Rome, N.Y. just after midnight.
Several shoppers were pushed to the ground, according to Oneida County Sheriff's Deputies. Two customers were transported to Rome Memorial Hospital with minor injuries.
One man was arrested for disorderly conduct.
In Kissimmee, Fla., two men got into a verbal altercation at a Walmart store early Friday morning, CBS Affiliate WKMG reports. When officers arrived to separate the men, the aggressor resisted and swung at one of the officers, police said.
The man was taken to the ground and arrested on charges of resisting arrest, WKMG said.
Late Thursday evening, CBS Affiliate KPHO reports, police evacuated workers from a Cave Creek, Ariz., Walmart and used a robotic device to remove a suspicious package found in an employee break room. The evacuation delayed the store's opening.
Later in the morning, another Phoenix television station reported witnesses saying police slammed a grandfather in a Walmart in Buckeye, Ariz., to the ground after he allegedly put a game in his waistband so that he could lift his grandson out of the crowd.
The incidents come as a record number of shoppers are expected to head out to stores across the country this weekend to take advantage of discounts of up to 70 percent. For three days starting on Black Friday, 152 million people are expected shop, up about 10 percent from last year, according to the National Retail Federation.
Indeed, about 600 shoppers were in line at a Target store in Brooklyn in New York when it opened at midnight. By the time it opened at midnight, nearly 2,000 shoppers wrapped around a Best Buy store in St. Petersburg, Fla. Mall of America, the nation's largest mall in North America, had 15,000 shoppers for its midnight opening. And more than 9,000 people were outside the flagship Macy's store in New York's Herald Square at its midnight opening, up from 7,000 a year ago.
"I came here for the deals," said Sidiki Traore, 59, from Roosevelt Island, N.Y. who bought three shirts for $50 at the Macy's. He also went to Toys R Us for its 9 p.m. opening on Thanksgiving and bought three toys for $106 for his four-year-old son.
The crowds are good news for retailers, many of which depend on the busy holiday shopping season for up to 40 percent of their annual revenue.
Some Occupy Wall Street protesters, which turned up for the Macy's midnight opening, are expected to plan flash mobs and other events later in the day in places like Chicago, Washington, D.C. and Boise, Idaho to urge people to reconsider shopping at national chains on Black Friday.
The U.S. Small Business Administration is also promoting Small Business Saturday, which encourages people to shop at smaller, mom-and-pop stores on the day after Black Friday.
Source: http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~r/CBSNewsMain/~3/-lWprWIkPds/
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