Northside seafood store owner says video shows mother, her children stealing drinks

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A troubling scene at a Northside seafood store where a mother and her children are accused of stealing while an employee turned his back.

The owner of the JJ’s Crab House sent News4JAX video because he said he could not believe a mother would encourage her children to do this.

The owner and his employees say the store is no stranger to petty theft. They often let it go without making a big deal out of it because they say there’s very little police can do to catch the perpetrators.

But they say it was hard to let it go this time.

In the video, a female in a black dress is ordering a seafood meal to go. The store owner said her mother and siblings can be seen behind her. Islam Ibrahim is the store employee behind the counter in the video.

Ibrahim said the mom and her kids all ransacked the refrigerator and took multiple bottled drinks that they quickly stuck in bags. But they didn’t know Ibrahim was watching their every move on a monitor in the back. He was keyed in on the mother who he says has been a regular customer.

“I saw the last two drinks she took before I replayed it on camera,” he said.

Then he says he walked out and confronted the mother.

“I said sweetie, how many drinks did you take? She said I didn’t take any. I told her, I just saw you on camera. I didn’t have the heart to snatch her purse. It’s disrespectful because she’s a lady,” he said.

Then the security camera captured something she said that raised red flags. She told Ibrahim she had previously stolen from the store.

“She said the last time I stole from you, none of you guys caught me,” he said.

But this isn’t what really angered Ibrahim and the store owner.

“The problem is she’s teaching her children how to steal. I find that very disrespectful and very wrong,” he said.

And now Ibrahim worries about the future of the kids who he says were stealing with their mom.

“There’s a saying in my language, in Kurdish, we say whatever you plant, that’s what’s going to grow. You cannot plant oranges and expect apples. So if she’s planting this in her kids’ heads, it’s going to be bad when they grow up,” Ibrahim said.

Both Ibrahim and the owner say the woman and her kids are no longer welcomed in the store.


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