Deformation of Character & Harassment!

On the day of 2020/09/30 around 14h00, me and my wife were shopping for some items at theScene in Cradlestone Mall. While in the shop we were looking at some shirt dresses at the corner of the shop. There was a lady behind us who was assisting us looking for sizes, unfortunately we couldn't find a size that would fit my wife and decided to leave the shop and go elsewhere in the mall.

As we walked out we saw a PepHome and decided to go shop some toiletries, upon our arrival at PepHome, in less than 10 minutes that we had exited theScene. A male security guard of the mall approached us and informed us that we are suspects of missing clothing items from theScene and escorted us back to theScene. To our surprise, a lady by the name of Lebo Grace (not sure of the surname) grabbed my wife's purse and began to go through claiming that we had ****** 4 Adidas tights that were worth a value of R600.00 each.

We denied these allegations and explained to her that we were assisted by the other lady which she claimed was her colleague who was with us the whole time till we walked out. There were 4 security guards, one lady and three gentlemen. We asked to speak to the manager of the shop or someone that had a superior position who can handle the matter, because Lebo Grace the lady was rude to us and kept shouting at us the whole time. Lebo Grace then said that she is the store manager, she will be the one dealing with all of this.

We could not reach a conclusion, we stood there for about an hour or more going back and forth with no solution. She insisted that it was only me and my wife in the shop and there is no way that we had not ****** those items. My wife told Lebo Grace that they should look at security footage of theScene, Cradlestone Mall and PepHome look for evidence that would incriminate us to no success. One security guard went to go check at PepHome if we had maybe dropped the items or hid them to no success, my wife further opened her bag and threw everything out on the table for them to see that there were no items we had ****** or had bought for that matter. As rude as she was she had the audacity to say to my wife "you can undress if you like" she was rude, gave us attitude and kept insisting that we had ****** the items. What troubles me is that she is so adamant that throughout the course of the day, there were no customers that could have possibly gone into the shop and took these items? People kept staring at us passing by the shop and looked at us as if we were ********* for something that we did not even do. Worse we had to stand there and listen to all the insults and indirect threats that she was saying to the guards.

Lebo Grace had said to the security guards, and I quote, "I hate people that shoplift with all of my heart, if i had caught them I was going to physically deal with them myself before the police or guards come. I will then bruise myself/scar myself and claim that these ********* attacked me and I acted in self defense" I believe that was an indirect threat.

One of the male security guards escorted me to our car and checked if these items were inside the car, I do not know when I could have possibly gone inside the car but they did not find anything in the car, in our position or where we had gone after exiting theScene.

The security guards informed her that there is nothing on the cctv footage that we had taken these items, we asked her to then call the police since we are being accused still she could not do anything. After a while waiting for nothing we asked to leave and went to the center management and laid a complaint. We spoke to a gentleman by the name of Kobus who further said that the matter should be handed over to the head office of theScene, that he is only responsible for the management of Cradlestone and is not responsible for the actions of the mall's tenants (theScene)

Security guards and the lady who was working at theScene with Lebo Grace apologized for the inconvenience, my wife asked Lebo Grace if there is anything that she would like to say? no to our surprise she confidently rep**** that "i do not owe you an apology whatsoever, because I am not crazy and I know what I am talking about"

This was a very unpleasant experience for us, to be harassed and mistreated this way. We stopped shopping and decided to leave the mall as our day was ruined, we felt very embarrassed and disrespected and no customer should go through such an experience. This matter should be taken serious and action should be made