iPad pandemonium struck at the Beijing launch of Apple’s second-gen tablet over the weekend when a suspected queue-jumper kicked off a brawl between customers and staff!
The insanity struck the one thousand-plus Chinese customers who gathered outside the Apple Store just before the much-anticipated iPad 2 was set to go on public release and the official word from Apple reports that a group outside became unruly and staff had to act “to protect themselves”.
However, eye-witnesses and now Beijing police suggest the altercation, which left several injured, started when a customer and his mother attempted to cut the queue of waiting Apple tablet customers, who had received numbered wristbands in a very organized queuing system, only to be confronted by the store manager who instigated the violence which saw the customer “dragged” more than ten metres and “beaten”.
It was later found that the customer didn’t even want an iPad 2 but was actually looking to buy himself a white iPhone 4 and got a little more than he bargained for from the aggrieved store manager!
The glass shop front was shattered, with another man and woman reportedly injured in the madness that followed. Apple employees shut up shop and re-opened the very next day to once again tackle the iPad 2 demand – with no brawls reported on the second attempt.
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