rkt | have a holly, jolly christmas

November 30, 2003 -- A Florida woman was knocked to the ground by callous shoppers and had a seizure after she made a dead-of-night trip to a Florida Wal-Mart with her sister to get computer-printer ink, then decided to stick around for the store's five-hour blitz sale starting at 6 a.m.
Patricia VanLester 41, was pushed to the floor by the bargain-hungry crowd, where doctors said she had a seizure. "They walked over her like a herd of elephants," said her sister, Linda Ellzey.

"I told them, 'Stop stepping on my sister! She's on the ground,' " said Ellzey, but the shoppers "just walked over her like she wasn't there."

Even worse was the family that joked about taking the stricken woman's $29 DVD player, intended as a Christmas gift for her mother and which she was clutching even as she lay unconscious.

"There was a lady there, and her two kids were laughing about it, saying 'Mom's going to take it,' " said Valeria Calabrese, who was in the store with her two children at the time but decided to leave when things got crazy.

"All they cared about was a stupid DVD player," Ellzey said yesterday.

Ambulance workers also said the crowd was more of a hindrance than a help as paramedics tried to reach VanLester, who was expected to remain in the hospital through the weekend.

"The people were all around this woman," said Mark O'Keefe of EVAC Ambulance. "They would not move . . . They were concerned about one thing: bargain shopping."

Her sister said that VanLester, who was flown to Halifax Medical Center in Daytona Beach, did not recognize her or know where she was.

"All she kept saying was, 'I want my mommy, I want my mommy,' " said Ellzey, who said her sister does not have a history of seizures or other medical conditions.

She said some of the other shoppers did try to help her sister by forming a barrier around her, but most were focused more on retail than rescue. Wal-Mart, the nation's largest retailer, based in Arkansas, apologized for the incident and said such melees were unheard of.

"We are very disappointed this happened," said spokeswoman Karen Burk. "We want her to come back as a shopper."

The store has offered to put the DVD player "on hold" for VanLester.

now, isn't that nice of them?

again, no comment.
courtesy of the ny post