This is the moment an alert store owner catches a woman who is pretending to be pregnant in order to stuff a bag of mushrooms under her clothing.
The incident happened at a small, family-run store in the city of Nanjing which is the capital of China’s Jiangsu province on 29th June.
The video shows the woman wearing a face mask as she looks backwards to make sure she is not being observed and stuffs the bag of mushrooms down her front.
When she then gets to the till, she hands over a much smaller bag to which the shopkeeper shakes her head to say that she will not accept this.
She then leans over, put her hand inside the woman’s clothing and pulls out the bag of mushrooms.
As other shoppers gather round, the shopkeeper then makes the embarrassed woman pay for the large bag of mushrooms at the same time lecturing her that she does not get off so easily before letting her go after she pays.
At one point she says sarcastically to the shoplifter: “Are you pregnant, it is the first I’ve heard of someone being pregnant with oyster mushrooms.”
Online commentators are divided over the shopkeeper’s activity with some pointing out that it was inappropriate for her to put her hand inside the woman’s clothing.
Others said that the thief had no doubt only resorted to theft because they were in financial difficulties, and it was wrong to expose her.
