Photograph courtesy of Social Media
In an effort to prevent gang attacks like the one that took Junior Guzman’s life, the NYPD has agreed with Bodega owners to install panic buttons and transmit live feeds of their surveillance to the NYPD. The move comes after a trend in violent robberies and gang-related attacks have spiked in recent months.
“Our goal is to protect ourselves, our patrons & our community from gang members. We understand that cameras are not enough to save a life, we must do more and we will with help from NYPD,” said Rahdames Rodriguez President of the UBA (the United Bodegas of America).
“Since Junior’s murder in June, the NYPD has made arrests, but now we need to prevent these type of crimes from happening. We need to learn from our past and become proactive, to prevent crime we need tools & training from NYPD”, said Fernando Mateo spokesman for the UBA in a press release statement.
The UBA leaders met with NYPD officials at 1 Police Plaza headquarters last week asking for panic buttons, taser guns, on premise pistol permits, beefed up police patrol and specialized training.
“With training, bodegas will become real safe havens,” Mateo said at last week’s news conference outside of NYPD headquarters in Lower Manhattan.
NYPD officials agreed to work with the 150 members of the United Bodegas of America, agreeing to provide owners with free security training, panic buttons that would send alerts to a bodega’s local precinct and live video feeds of the store’s security cameras to their local precincts, but refused to allow owners to have tasers and pistol permits, according to the UBA.
“Arming shop owners would be too dangerous for their safety,” a police spokesman said.
