Staff hospitalized after being attacked at Winnipeg Foodfare store, police say

Three employees of a Winnipeg grocery store were sent to hospital Tuesday evening, police say, and a 17-year-old is accused of assaulting them while wearing brass knuckles.

Officers were called around 6:40 p.m. to the Foodfare on Portage Avenue at Burnell Street, but the attacker was gone when they arrived, a police news release said.

The three staff, men age 19, 22 and 46, were all taken to hospital with upper-body injuries.

Police said the accused teen was in the store earlier in the day and escorted out by staff. They did not say why.

He returned with the weapon and attacked the three men before running away, police allege.

Police found the teen in an alley on Selkirk Avenue some time later and located brass knuckles in a nearby yard.

The teen is facing charges of assault and possession of a weapon.

Indigenous leaders and the owners of Foodfare were scheduled to speak about the incident at an 11:30 a.m. news conference on Wednesday but have since cancelled the event.

A news release was sent out Tuesday night by the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, announcing the press conference. It said the event would include Grand Chief Cathy Merrick and brothers Munther and Tarik Zeid, who own five Foodfare stores in the city.

But at 9:30 a.m., the AMC sent a one-line updated release saying the event was cancelled. No reasons were given.

Munther Zeid told CBC on Tuesday that he had no comment.

The Portage Foodfare has been under scrutiny for how it handles suspected shoplifters, but police won't say if this assault is connected to previous ones.

"We can only speak to this incident and the fact that the earlier presence of the male inside the store, being taken out of the store, and the subsequent attack on the employees are completely, 100 per cent related," police spokesperson Const. Claude Chancy said. 

The AMC has had a long relationship with Foodfare, but it was severed at the end of April after a woman was allegedly punched by a supervisor at the Portage store.

The woman, who later told a witness she was First Nations, had been accused of shoplifting.

The AMC was using Foodfare for food orders and vouchers under a federal program that ensures First Nations kids can swiftly get essential products and services, Merrick said at that time, announcing the organization was cutting ties with the grocery chain.

Shortly after the April incident, Munther Zeid said in an Instagram post that the employee accused of punching the woman had been suspended but not fired.

"While we acknowledge the gravity of the situation, the employee involved is also from a marginalized community who has experienced many challenges in their life, and we believe that firing this employee is not the right course of action at this stage," the post said.

"Instead, we view this incident as an opportunity for education, growth and repair."

In the original news release about Wednesday's news conference, the AMC said it is working closely with Foodfare's owners, "who have expressed their sincere apologies" for the April incident.

"The owners have agreed to implement cultural sensitivity training for their staff and to draft a comprehensive policy to address shoplifting," the release said.