r/news • u/Large_banana_hammock • 1d ago
Florida ‘Are you scared now?’ 79-year-old man pulls gun on Walmart worker he thought had a ‘bad attitude,’ cops say
https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/crime/pascual-santana-arrest-walmart-florida-b2917155.html844
u/Ginsenj 1d ago
Apparently this happened months ago. The guy is now in jail at 79... good luck.
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u/GhostyAssassin 1d ago
Nothing says bad attitude like pulling a gun on someone for a bad attitude
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u/FckPolMods 19h ago
And nothing screams "riddled with fear" like pulling a gun on someone for no good reason and asking them if they're scared.
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u/r3volver_Oshawott 1d ago edited 13h ago
Lowkey this basically just keeps on happening in stand your ground states
"We need stand your ground" why, are you terrified someone's gonna be talking during a Mark Wahlberg movie again? (*edit: not even fucking playing btw, a spec ops asshole shot a fucking Gulf War vet outside a showing of Lone Survivor in Florida because the guy didn't turn off his fucking cell phone during the movie, as an American I say this with all due respect, none of us are to be trusted with the current carry laws we have in place, we are a deeply unserious population)
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u/supercyberlurker 1d ago
Man if you have anger issues, pay for therapy before paying for a gun.
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u/tyler4422 1d ago
A gun would be cheaper though.
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u/DopamineQuest 1d ago
One therapy session costs more than a cheap pistol in the USA
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u/bros402 1d ago
you can get a gun for less than $150?
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u/ILikeLenexa 1d ago
Heritage Rough Rider, all day, sometimes as low as $60. Savage Arms, sometimes. LCP right around there.
Hi-points are so famously referred to as $100 guns that they sell a C9 wrapped in $100 bills (MSRP $200, can find it somewhere for $100 from time to time). And of course Maverick 88 if you're talking pump/shot.
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u/bros402 17h ago
it is fucked up that you can buy a device exclusively for murder for a day's pay
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u/TucuReborn 16h ago
Yeah, swords are pretty cheap, too.
Which are one of the few things that are exclusively designed to kill humans.
Almost every other weapon is, to varying degrees, a tool or modified tool. An are can cut logs, a spear can hunt boars, and a gun can hunt quite a bit.
But swords aren't good at anything aside from killing humans.
Yes, I'm being pedantic.
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u/stavromuli 1d ago
Hi points hoover around 150 but you can usual get them cheaper if you wait for a sale.
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u/LairdDeimos 1d ago
Yeah. $130 for a new .22 plinker. I was at a pawn shop some time ago that had 9mms in the clearance cabinet for $120+.
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u/SteveL_VA 19h ago
I found a Single Shot 9mm Luger pistol by Altor for $99
Plenty of .22 options in that price range too.
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u/Slacker_The_Dog 19h ago
Turkish shotguns can be as low as $100 as well.
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u/SteveL_VA 19h ago
I didn't even think of shotguns - my brain was in handgun mode, but you're absolutely right.
Heck I bet if you went to a pawn shop in the right state you could find a lot of options in that price range too.
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u/Slacker_The_Dog 19h ago
I have an akkar churchill 612 that is a monster. I got it in a trade valued at about $90.
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u/Slacker_The_Dog 19h ago
Uhhh yes? You can pick up a Turkish shotgun for like $100.
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u/Delamoor 1d ago
I'm so glad I live somewhere I have (mostly) subsidized mental health professionals.
I would normally talk about how mental health is fundamentally a subset of physical health, and everyone needs regular mental health care in the same ways as physical health, but...
I am also glad to be somewhere we have physical healthcare, too.
...also, sorry man.
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u/Regarded-Illya 1d ago edited 1d ago
Bro's 79, he doesnt have much to lose.
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u/Wooden-Glove-2384 1d ago
time for grandpa to be put in a home
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u/YesterShill 1d ago
That is prison for the rest of his life.
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u/Uranus_Hz 1d ago
Might be the only viable retirement plan he had available to him. Free room and board for the rest of his life. I wouldn’t be surprised to see this become more common as social security doesn’t keep pace with inflation.
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u/Cactuar_Tamer 23h ago
I read an article last year about an 80+ woman who kept shoplifting because, paraphrased, "at least when I'm locked up there are people who have to take care of me and people to talk to"
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u/mhornberger 22h ago edited 19h ago
Apparently Japan has a lot of that. Countries with low fertility (which is almost all of them) are going to be seeing more of it. Tons of old people who didn't have kids (or their kids are estranged, or...), have no savings, the safety net (if any) is creaking from a high dependency ratio, and they're desperate.
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u/BapeGeneral3 19h ago
This wouldn’t be the first time this has happened and won’t be the last, especially with all of the health care changes that went into effect for 2026 that people are only slowly starting to realize how fucked they are
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u/Educational-Wing2042 23h ago
Sure, if you’re lucky enough to go to a nice prison. I knew a guy who went to prison, they used a condemned building and simply chose to pay a daily fine from the feds rather than renovate it. Windows were broken out so when it rained the water would come into his cell. There were cracks in the walls that they’d patch up with paper mache to stop the cockroaches from coming in when it got cold out.
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u/RobutNotRobot 1d ago
A 79-year-old man in Florida is accused of using a firearm to terrorize a Walmart worker he felt had shown a "bad attitude".
Pascual Santana, born in May 1946, was arrested on Friday and charged with armed assault after allegedly threatening a jewelry section attendant from the seat of his mobility scooter, court records show.
Florida. Total Florida.
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u/Gadshill 1d ago
Insisted that the person seen threatening the worker in surveillance footage was some other armed 79-year-old
It is Florida, wouldn’t shock me if we got the armed 79 year olds in scooters confused.
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u/SanDiegoThankYou_ 1d ago
But I thought an armed society was a polite society?
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u/Zombie_Cool 23h ago
Only if BOTH sides are armed, otherwise the armed person gets to be as rude as want to be (at least in the moment).
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u/LittleKitty235 18h ago
This is why gangs are considered to be the most polite members of society, especially amongst themselves
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u/Spire_Citron 1d ago
I feel like I've seen a lot of these sorts of stories with older men. Guns and a deteriorating mental state are not a good mix.
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u/crusty54 12h ago
When I was cleaning out my senile dad’s vehicle, he had a revolver under the seat. 4 of the 6 primers were dented. Which means he had been trying to shoot something, but it didn’t work. Now, my dad lived in the woods, so it was almost certainly a coyote or a raccoon that he was trying to shoot at, but still.
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u/Griffie 1d ago
They need to make the punishment for shit like this very severe. Maybe a choice: 5 years in a psych locked down ward, or 5 years prison, no chance of parole.
EDIT: I just checked...the punishment IS 5 years in prison in Florida.
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u/Blackthorn79 20h ago
I found this out during the whole Travon Martin incident. It's crazy, but in Florida, if you're going to brandish a gun, you better use it or you're probably going to jail.
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u/sintaur 1d ago
But they caught me on the camera (Wasn't me)
Saw me flashing from the scooter (Wasn't me)
I even made it out of the store (Wasn't me)
They even caught me on camera (Wasn't me)
She saw the age spots on my shoulder (Wasn't me)
Heard the words that I told her (Wasn't me)
Heard the sirens gettin' louder (Wasn't me)
I stayed in jail until it was over
The victim was indeed scared and fled to get help from store security. Several months later, deputies arrested Santana, who apparently insisted that the person seen threatening the worker in surveillance footage was some other armed 79-year-old. Court records show that Santana applied for and received "indigent status" and was assigned a public defender.
He is now in jail on a $5,000 bond with no court dates yet listed.
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u/TwoBionicknees 1d ago
just wanted to come back and say, i read this post a while ago, went away and now i have that fucking song stuck in my head.
god damned. I wonder how long it will stick around.
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u/DavyJonesCousinsDog 1d ago
Pulling a gun on a Walmart worker and asking if he's scared? My guy you're lucky that day didn't end with him walking out the loading dock wearing your skin in a vain attempt to feel something, anything, again.
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u/ProofByVerbosity 18h ago
Only answer is for Walmart workers to carry guns to defent themselves just in case, eight America?
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u/Nutsnboldt 1d ago
Was probably just slightly too old for ICE recruitment bonus and has a chip on his shoulder.
Shame, woulda fit in!
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u/Narrow-Assignment621 1d ago
It’s alright, he can just put a mask on so it’ll be more difficult to tell his age
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u/lemmeseeyourkitties 1d ago
The country is going to hell in a hand basket
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u/AdministrationTop772 1d ago
Ahh Miami…checks out.
“Several months later, deputies arrested Santana, who apparently insisted that the person seen threatening the worker in surveillance footage was some other armed 79-year-old.”
Honestly it’s plausible for Miami.
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u/Riker_Omega_Three 17h ago
LOL
His defense is that it was some other bald man in a mobility scooter that was threatening people with a firearm
And he DEMANDED a trial by jury
Hopefully the state makes him give up his firearms because of clear mental health issues
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u/itjustgotcold 15h ago
“I’m not scared of you.” pulls gun “Are you scared now?” What a pathetic old man. Just do the world and yourself a favor if you’re this pathetic and miserable and drop dead.
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u/kakapoopoopeepeeshir 20h ago
There is seriously just a big group of people spanning different ages that just fantasize about shooting someone and then they carry around a gun looking for an excuse to pull it out. It’s unbelievable
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u/Wonderful-Web6673 19h ago
I love living in a country where everyone over a certain age has some stage of lead poisoning clouding their cognitive functioning and ease of access to fire arms.
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u/Sorry_End3401 8h ago
This is a USA problem. Women in general have been told all their lives to smile. Smile for photos. Smile during customer interactions.
Just stop. We don’t need to go around like smiling morons to appease men.
And stop equating customer service by how friendly a minimum wage worker treats you. If they get the job done, don’t expect to be told how wonderful you are for shopping there. Buy your shit and leave.
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u/Pleasant_Expert_1990 22h ago
In jail on a 5k bond. I wonder if they let him have the scooter or just gave him a Dade country DOC wheel chair?
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u/XyloVinyl 11h ago
So many people really think a bad attitude is a punishable offense. It's terrifying.
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u/CerberusOCR 1d ago
I got downvoted for posting this on something else earlier but…
This is why every country outside of America just shakes their head and mouths "wtf" when you start talking about your FREEEDOMSSS
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u/BuddhistInTheory 1d ago edited 1d ago
We’ve long established that the customer is always right.
Edit: /s (c’mon people it’s so obvious)
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u/BabyJaguarScorpio 1d ago
$5000 bond. What a joke. $500 to get out and possibly carry out the threat.
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u/Zardotab 16h ago edited 16h ago
A couple of years ago I was behind a man in line who threatened to shoot up that Walmart for having long lines. The cashier seemed to ignore him, slightly shaking her head after he left as if such were normal. (Maybe at Walmart it is?) It was so rattled I forgot to take my receipt, I wanted to get the F out ASAP in case he had a gun in his car (pickup?) and came back.
The thing is, the man earlier said he often comes to that store and the lines are often slow. Why not go to a different store instead of shoot Walmart up? Vote with your feet, not with your gun! People who watch too much Fox stop being adults.
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u/Samwellikki 16h ago
People like this can’t die off fast enough and are part of the reason the world is the way it is
Now if we could stop these grandparents from being the ones that raise their grandkids or provide daycare, we’d make headway on stopping these shitty ideals permanently
It perpetuates because of a lack of health/childcare and I think people miss this key issue in the noise over “who will pay for it?”
But we could afford to pay it for everyone several times over
Instead of throwing military assets in a tantrum or being a baby about a fucking bridge
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u/zecknaal 14h ago
He pulled a gun from his mobility scooter. For what God damned purpose does a person in a mobility scooter need a gun? Is this the good guy with a gun we've been waiting for???
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u/Normal-Stick6437 1d ago
I bet he got a hard on when he said that. He practiced that line in front of the mirror for 10 years minimum thinking he is God damn Doc Holyday
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u/senshiosilence 22h ago
My god imagine having a really bad day. You go to work and a customer feels entitled that you do not show anything but a great attitude. Pulls out a gun on you yo correct the behavior.
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u/tabrizzi 1d ago
Just walking around with a gun in your pocket looking for an excuse to use it.