Moment Iceland security guard arms himself with a shopping basket to ward off thief aiming kicks at him
An Iceland security guard has been filmed arming himself with a shopping basket to stave off a suspected thief aiming kicks at him.
The shop employee is seen backing away before picking up the basket to use as a shield against the intruder at his store's entrance in Walworth, south-east London.
A customer filmed the confrontation on their mobile phone, appearing to show the suspected offender then picking up a bag and running away down the street.
The 17-second video footage has now been widely shared online, after the clash at the Iceland supermarket outlet in Walworth Road.
The latest incident comes after it was revealed last month that annual shoplifting offences recorded by police in England and Wales had passed half a million for the first time.
Viewers of the Walworth footage have been praising the brave security guard for his quick-thinking response.
One named Aaron said: 'The staff shouldn't have to put up with it. Scum.'
Another said: 'These security guards don't get paid enough. In my opinion.'
The shop employee is seen backing away before picking up the basket to use as a shield against the intruder at his store's entrance in Walworth, south-east London
As reported by the website NeedToKnow, Joseph Peters asked: 'Can you get much lower than robbing Iceland?'
Another poster joked: 'If I was going to shoplift I'd go to M&S. Not Iceland.'
Footage has also been shared on TikTok, with more responses suggesting sympathy for the security guard as well as dismay at Britain's shoplifting problems.
One commenter responded to the video by saying: 'Security don't get paid enough to do this kind of work - that's why I quit.'
Other remarks included, 'Well done security', 'No one should have to put up with this doing a day's work' and 'Not the security picking up the basket - bless, he did well'.
Yet there were also concerns raised over whether the Iceland employee should have responded and potentially put himself at risk.
TikTok viewers wrote responses including, 'Just leave them, it's not your shop' and 'Brother, just watch him and go, because every item in the shop is insured'.
This latest incident comes amid mounting concerns about shoplifting plaguing UK supermarkets as well as smaller retail outlets - and threats to staff members.
The number of shoplifting offences recorded by police in England and Wales has passed half a million for the first time, figures revealed last month.
Some 516,971 offences were logged by forces last year, up by 20 per cent from 429,873 in 2023.
The total is the highest since current police records began 22 years ago in 2003, according to the Office for National Statistics.
But real figures are likely to be far higher given many shopkeepers feel it is pointless to report offences to police, retail leaders have said.
An Association of Convenience Stores member survey suggested 6.2million thefts were recorded by convenience stores alone.
And four fifths of retailers have reported being robbed in the past year, a separate poll by the British Independent Retailers Association found.
Retail crime costs store owners more than £2.2bn a year, according to the British Retail Consortium.
Cleveland and Nottinghamshire appeared to record the most offences relative to population, with 14.3 and 13.1 per 1,000 people respectively, last month's ONS statistics showed.
London was also a hotspot, with almost ten offences recorded in the year to December 2024 per 1,000 people.
Of the 494,086 police-recorded shoplifting offences in England and Wales in 2024 that have so far been assigned an outcome, 19 per cent (93,156) resulted in a charge or summons, PA analysis of Home Office statistics has suggested.
This was up from 17 per cent in 2023, while 57 per cent (281,107) of investigations were completed with no suspect identified, unchanged on the previous year.
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