Mall evacuated after Nike Foam shoppers get unruly
The longest chain of shoes in the Guinness World Record books on display in the courtyard of the National Geographic Society in Washington, DC, on July 2, 2008. Tied by the laces and placed heel-to-toe, the sneakers measured 8,700 feet (2,651.7meters).
The Maryland State Police and Hagerstown police evacuated Valley Mall in Hagerstown, Md., on Saturday after 150 people waiting to buy Nike Foam sneakers became unruly.
“Apparently, a lot of people had been waiting a long time and people started butting in line,” Washington County Sheriff Douglas Mullendore told the Baltimore Herald.
Some of the customers had gotten in line in front of the mall’s Footlocker store at 7:30 p.m. the night before, the Baltimore Sun reported. Others had driven up from Washington, DC, some 70 miles away, according to the Baltimore Herald.
No one was arrested in the melee because, Mullendore told the Baltimore Herald, “It was impossible to tell who the aggressors were. There was just a lot of hollering and that type of thing when we got there.”
The new Nike Foam sneakers cost more than $200 a pair at Footlocker but could sell for $500 on the Internet, Mullendore told the Baltimore Herald.
When the mall was reopened a short while later, customers were escorted into the Footlocker store a few at a time, the Baltimore Sun reported. The store sold out of the 90 pairs it had in stock before 10 a.m.
Just two months ago, police had to break up rioting shoppers in malls across the country as they fought over new shipments of $180 Air Jordan 11 Retro Concords.
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