I'm having trouble processing this...

[depechemodefan]

Say the average customer goes to the store and see it is closed. Next time the customer goes to the store, they will ask what happened, and the cashier or produce manager or whoever they talk to will say, "oh, there was a death in the deli" or even "there was an accident." The customer might just be pissed.

But if the same customer had come in the store while the body or police or the investigation was going on, the customer would be freaking out because of dead body or there is blood or "I might have walked in someone's brains!" and the fall out would be worse.

Of course, the customer might not care about the dead body in the body bag.

But I think the customer will bitch more about being in a store with a dead person and blood and brain in view then about the store being closed.

I feel sorry for the family of the suicide.

[Antisocial_Worker]

Of course, the customer might not care about the dead body in the body bag.

This.

Unfortunately.

When I got to my job at Motel Hell tonight, I asked the second shift clerk if he'd heard about this, especially because they finally released the name and background of the victim today. The clerk said he had heard of it, and he'd heard of it when he was checking in a guest earlier. The guest was talking about this event and noted that they had been shopping at that store at the time of the suicide.

Thing is, though, the guest said they'd been a bit pissed off at all the chaos in the store.

"I'm from California," said the guest, "Things like that happen there all the time and nobody cares."

They went on to say that they'd continued their shopping, and were a bit put out that the checker seemed upset when they finally reached her line.

[Seanette]

Being a California resident, I'm pretty sure that events like the one in the OP are NOT as routine as that vile thing masquerading as a guest claimed.

[Minflick]

Wow. I've never been shopping ANYWHERE here in California where somebody killed themselves. Ever. I'm 61, and have lived here all my adult life.

My high school in Los Angeles was 1 block from a high rise apartment building, and some woman threw herself off the roof, landed on the sidewalk, cracked the cement, bounced and landed on the roof of a car, which she totaled. It was NOT treated as NBD, they announced it over the PA and told us to go home a different route if our normal route went on that street, and the street was closed to cars, etc. I've been in stores where someone had a medical emergency, and that caused enough ruckus and pretty much brought the store to a stand still, I can't imagine how much worse it would be for a suicide! Nobody gets blase about that, for the love of Mike.

[Nunavut Pants]

Yup, what Min said. I've only been in CA for ~30 years, but suicides in my area (Silicon Valley/south SF Bay Area) are not routinely ignored.

[bainsidhe]

and kept management and anyone available with HAZMAT training to deal with the aftermath.

No, just no. There are companies that clean scenes like this. Managers are people too, and they knew and worked with this person. No way should any employee, including management, agree to clean the area.

[Antisocial_Worker]

For what it's worth, a friend of mine recently tendered her resignation with this supermarket chain, and it was partly due to the way this incident was handled. She starts her new job at an auto parts store this coming week.

[CyberLurch]

On another news site there was only one comment for this story (when I looked last night) and it said simply, "who cares?" People are incredibly desensitized. They'd probably step over the still-warm body of this employee to get to a sale item.

I was in the service, and as a matter of course, it was drilled into our heads that death was/is an inevitable part of our job should it ever come to armed conflict. We had to be able to shrug it off and soldier on. Even in peacetime, though, bad things happen. Accidents, suicides, homicides. We were trained to cope.

Nevertheless, a death in the ranks was never treated with as much indifference as the store did in the original post. That in itself is a sad commentary - when civilians are more callous and indifferent than trained professional military personnel.

[Aislin]

We had two people killed in front of the store I worked at and a 4 yr old boy injured, shot through the leg. Straight up gangland murders and they just closed that exit and made a employee direct the customers to the other entrance. I am so glad I quit