The situation unfolded over a couple of hours. It's been described as surreal by both our security people who were on the ground at the store as well as the staff who were in the store through the event. Before the riot happened, there was a situation in which one of my security people was standing on the inside of our locked glass doors, and on the outside a masked individual walked up in this large gathering and spray-painted the front of our store, in plain view of everyone.
While we certainly could have arrested that person, none of the passersby could, because that actually is not an indictable offence, as I understand. I'm not a criminal prosecutor, but that would be a summary conviction offence.
To me, as soon as that and some of the other events happened, like fires being set, it became a very destabilizing environment. People didn't know what to do with themselves. They were receiving text messages from loved ones, who were watching in live action in media these scenes of great violence and these fires that were taking place.
Our staff initially huddled into a room about the size of the committee chamber here, and then ultimately into a smaller room, which was the security office, behind multiple locked doors. They were fully safe, but it was hard for them to believe that, given what they were able to see on the video screens in the security office. It was described as out of control zombies attacking the store. That was the description our people used. They used words like “terrified” and “traumatized”.
Obviously, we have an excellent employee assistance program and we've been able to provide support for those folks. This is an event they'll never forget. It was dangerous. It was terrifying.
When you call emergency services, because of the priority level, they won't come to a large bonfire built 20 feet in front of your store. They can't send a fire truck. It's a very unnerving situation, and our people never thought they would find themselves in that situation for simply working in a retail store downtown in a major city.