Not only is a hammer to the head something that can kill you, being cracked over the skull with a full bottle of vodka can put a person in the morgue, too.
People who wonder why witnesses to smash-and-grab robberies in jewelry stores or LCBO stores don’t do more just need to watch this latest video of a booze heist in west Toronto.
It’s a big decision to put your life on the line over some alcohol or gold. Some, it seems, are willing to do so.
Believed to be from Tuesday night at the LCBO in the Martinway Plaza along The Westway near Martingrove Rd., the video shows customers of the liquor store trying to block the alleged thieves from getting out of the store with their bags of stolen hooch.
USING FULL BOOZE BOTTLES AS WEAPONS
At one point, one of the alleged thieves is seen breaking a bottle over someone’s head and then reaching for a second full bottle and swinging it — before the on-the-spot unofficial security gives way and lets them open the door and get past and away with their haul.
“This is exactly what I like to see,” X user Shauhn.SGT(ret) on the platform. “Citizens standing up against criminals. It’s about time.”
It is nice to watch, for sure. And it certainly is overdue.
Canadian patriots block alcohol robbers at a Toronto LCBO. pic.twitter.com/zPzmvFuHxs
— Efrain Flores Monsanto 🇨🇦🚛 (@efloresmonsanto) October 22, 2025
But it’s also very dangerous. Is it worth it to get hit with a full glass bottle on the skull and perhaps die — especially when the LCBO’s security, whose job it is to protect that store, often don’t put themselves at risk?
What’s happening at the LCBO is in stark contrast to what we are seeing in the larger mall jewelry store attacks where masked punks with hammers go in as a gang and smash the display cases while the employees, passersby and even security are often seen in videos just standing there waiting for them to finish.
MAYBE IT’S TIME TO TASER THESE THIEVES
It’s not pretty to watch. Maybe it’s time to start giving private security more tools, training and support to go in and taser these guys, tackle them, or maybe hit them with bear spray.
If it keeps up, it won’t be long before every product is put behind a secure counter and there will be no more browsing.
For now, it’s still open season.
These criminals are smug and calm. They know they are above the rules and, even if they are caught, that they will be released soon after. It’s creating a lawlessness that resembles anarchy. Anything goes and despite billions paid to police, the courts and legislators, there seems to be no answer for youth with a blunt object and no fear.
However, people seem to have had enough of these thugs.
As of Wednesday afternoon, Toronto Police have not reported on any call for a robbery in progress at this particular LCBO.
The only resistance seemed to be from the customers themselves. You can’t blame the cops, however, if no one calls them.
“The security guy was in the Shoppers Drug Mart,” one of the fellow store employees told the Toronto Sun . “He didn’t get back in time.”
But, realistically, what could he really do?
Another store owner told me that many times after they steal the bottles of booze, these robbers then grab stuff from the drug store, the dollar store or go into the food stores and steal chips or “boxes of food that we have paid a lot for and don’t get anything back once it’s stolen.”
SMALL BUSINESS TARGETED
This owner said that, unlike the LCBO, which is backstopped by the government, his business is really hurt by these criminals — to the tune of thousands of dollars a year.
“It’s a real problem,” he said.
Another store owner said the security guards told him that they are lectured about what they can and can’t do when someone is stealing and they’re nervous about getting hurt or in trouble themselves.
It's out of control -- the criminals can do what they want and know it -- this time at the Pickering Town Centre https://t.co/tXkbe0RhYn
— Joe Warmington (@joe_warmington) October 22, 2025
You can see this fear in the people in recent videos at both the Pickering Town Centre and Erin Mills Town Centre. They look helpless, standing there. Their hands are literally tied.
Sure, one would like to go and stop these creeps. But not only could people end up getting hurt, but also charged, as we have seen in alleged vigilante justice cases in recent times.
The two recent incidents that stand out for me are in Peterborough and Lindsay where the people defending themselves face tougher justice than the perpetrators. In the case in Peterborough, a young Indian foreign student working in a convenience store hit a guy with a bat that he was originally attacked with and now faces a trial that could see him end up in prison. Same goes for a guy who allegedly had a guy in his apartment with a crossbow but is facing incarceration for fighting back with an alleged knife from his kitchen.
Another angle of the EMTC robbery #mississauga
— 905HUB (@905hub_) October 20, 2025
🎥 Slow-Battle-583 https://t.co/hoP9lpk3oG pic.twitter.com/JVWoNpultV
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Perhaps the most frustrated guy in Ontario is the premier himself, who has come out in favour of these people defending their property and floated the idea of Canada taking on a castle law doctrine that allows more leeway to protect your property and self.
That said, I think those guys at the Martinway Plaza were on to something that could work. Whether it’s the LCBO or a jewelry store, create a new security scenario where you can just lock them in and keep them there until the police show up.
And then, whether it’s a hammer, or crowbar, or a full 40-ounce bottle of whisky, hit them with attempted murder charges.
