A Walmart store is under fire from the Black community in Rhode Island after a customer posted a picture of a Black employee sitting inside a storage rack that many assumed was a makeshift jail to promote a fundraiser.
Angela Boateng told the Providence Journal that she spotted the display on June 21 and was “mortified.” She went to the Walmart on Silver Spring Street in Providence to make a return, and she spotted a Black employee inside the storage rack near the front of the store with signs outside of the storage rack.
One of the signs read, “I’m in jail!!! I need bail!!! Help me raise $50 to get out!!” The display was to help fundraise money for the Hasbro Children’s Miracle Network.
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Boateng took a picture of the display that was later shared on social media by Angela Ankoma, who leads the Rhode Island Foundation’s Equity Leadership Initiative.
“As I was exiting that Walmart on Silver Spring, I noticed this cage, and I felt like I saw somebody and I went closer … and I’m like, is there a young male in the cage? I just did not understand what was happening, but I was mortified,” Boateng recalled in an interview with The Providence Journal on June 22. “And as I went closer to read what was on the cage, I don’t know really what came over me. I was just deeply offended.”
Boateng added that she attempted to complain to a Walmart employee but was unsuccessful. The identity of the Black employee was not revealed.
“Walmart and Hasbro [Hospital] need to acknowledge their actions,” Boateng said to the Providence Journal. “They need to apologize and let the community know what active steps they’re taking to ensure this doesn’t happen again. And I think that they just need to come public with it.”
Walmart Corp. spokesman Joe Pennington said…
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