After Shooting, Mall Says It Did Everything to Keep People Safe
An up-and-coming rapper was murdered in front of Los Angeles’ Beverly Center mall on May 18, and his suspected killer was arrested a few hours later. Beverly Center management said it did everything possible to keep people on its property safe after the shooting of rapper Roderick Anthony Burton II, age 21.
“It came out of nowhere,” said Beverly Center marketing director Susan Vance of the shooting.
Burton performed under the name Dolla. The 21-year-old musician suffered gunshot wounds to the head as he walked from the parking garage near the La Cienega Boulevard side of the Beverly Center. According to police, Burton argued with his suspected killer upon landing at Los Angeles International Airport earlier that day. The suspect fled in a silver Mercedes-Benz SUV after the shooting, which occurred at 3:10 p.m. Police found the SUV in an airport parking lot later that day. They arrested Aubrey Louis Berry, 23, of Georgia as he allegedly tried to board a plane with a gun in his possession.
Vance said Beverly Center security has worked with the Los Angeles Police Department to keep the mall safe in case of such a crime. “We were prepared as much as we could have been,” Vance said. She declined to name specific security procedures.
Security expert Chris McGoey said there are many limits to what retailers and mall owners can do to prevent shootings on their properties. “It’s not going to be like a nightclub where you’re going to pat people down and make them go through metal detectors,” McGoey said. It would not only cost thousands of dollars to install metal detectors at mall entrances, but a heavy security presence could drive customers away from shopping at the mall, he said. McGoey is president of McGoey Security Consulting, located in Murrieta, Calif. He writes about retail loss prevention and other security matters at his Web site (www.crimedoctor.com).
Although there was no mall security order for a lockdown, some retailers shut their doors for more than five minutes after the shooting, said Sara Dovan, co-owner of pioneering men’s fashion store Traffic. The manager reopened the boutique’s door only after a friend who is a police officer confirmed there was no danger. However, traffic at the mall remained low because Los Angeles police forbade people from leaving or entering the Beverly Center’s parking lot for more than an hour after the shooting. Restrictions on entering the center were lifted around 5 p.m. “Then business picked up in the evening,” Dovan said. “When people found out there was no crazy man in the mall, people stopped panicking.”
A solitary crime most likely would have no effect on retail traffic to the mall, according to Howard Forman, a marketing professor at California State University, Fullerton. “If this was a series of shootings, if it was sustained for a long period of time, you would see a dramatic drop in traffic,” he said. —Andrew Asch
