(NewsNation) — The Colorado supermarket employee who was fired from his job after recording an alleged shoplifting incident is now speaking out.
“I just thought: ‘Record,'” said Santino Burrola, a King Soopers worker who recently captured on video three men fleeing the store he worked at with hundreds of dollars worth of laundry detergent.
“What better evidence than video evidence?” he said. “Their faces, the vehicle description and the license plate all in one.”
Burrola said he was alerted to the alleged shoplifters by a co-worker.
“She told me to get the plate number,” he said. “And I caught the tail end of the guy leaving outside the door with a cart full of laundry detergent and scent boosters.”
“Really bro? You gotta resort to this? The economy’s not that bad,” Burrola can be heard saying in the video he posted to TikTok. Footage shows Burrola ripping off tinfoil that was covering up the vehicle’s license plate.
When he went back to work for his next shift, Burrola was suspended. He was fired the next week.
Now, Burrola feels like he was punished for doing the right thing, CBS Colorado reported.
In a statement, King Soopers responded to Burrola’s firing, saying, “Video recording the assailants as they were loading the car was stolen merchandise and peeling off the aluminum foil their license plate before they pulled off. This is a violation of company policy. And as a result, Santina was being discharged for employment and King Soopers today June 30.”
Burrola said he knew only “not to touch them,” but despite the company’s policy, his moral compass wouldn’t allow a crime to occur.
“Wrong is wrong,” he said. “A crime was being committed and I wasn’t just gonna let anything happen no matter what the policy. My moral compass wouldn’t allow crime to happen. You know? It was not how I was raised, you know, like stealing.”
Erik Vancleave with the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office is among the law enforcement officials investigating the incident.
“This is a mob mentality is what we’re seeing across the United States, whether it’s Denver, Colorado, or Los Angeles or Chicago,” he said. “It’s a mob mentality where they rush into the store, they’ll fill baskets up, and they’ll immediately take the baskets, whether it’s formula or Downy detergent, and they’ll run out … unstopped.”
Vancleave said the alleged shoplifters do not care how much it’s going to cost the consumers.
“They do not care,” he said. “There are no consequences at this point.”
