Two 7–Eleven clerks at Stockton, California, are facing an investigation by local police after they were shown on video beating a man who was attempting to rob their store. 

In the viral video showing the attack on the shoplifter, one of the clerks can be seen holding him down while the other continuously hits him with a wooden pole. The shoplifter tries to kick the man wielding the weapon, to no avail. The man had entered the store masked and carrying a large trash bin that he then filled with cigarettes he had taken from behind the counter. 

As he empties the shelves of cigarettes, the shoplifter threatens the two clerks as they continuously demand that he stop. At one point, the man pulls what appears to be a handgun out of his back pocket. 

The existence of the criminal investigation was first reported by KCRA-3, a local television station. 

The man who took the video, who only identified himself to journalists as “Deda,” said he was trying to diffuse the situation so no one would get hurt. Throughout the video, Deda tells the clerks that “there’s nothing you can do” until police arrive to deal with the situation.

Deda — who owns a small business just feet from the convenience store — told KCRA-3 that he stopped by the  7–Eleven to get gas and a drink when he witnessed the incident. “I’m trying to feel it out,” Deda told the outlet. “My job is to make it home … I wanted to maintain neutral in the situation.” He also said he “was a little startled” by what he saw. 

The situation prompted locals to weigh in not on the actions of the shoplifter but of the clerks. It is unclear if the clerks were also the owners of the store or just employees. The editors of one California newspaper, the Modesto Bee, penned a piece on Saturday that argued the clerks had “gone too far” in protecting the property of the store. 

“Although brazen stealing is frustrating, costly and dangerous to store employees, confronting it with violence that far exceeds self-defense is not the answer,” the editors wrote. “Where is the line when it comes to protecting property?” they asked, later claiming that “frustration doesn’t justify violence.”

The Modesto Bee made the claim that the clerks likely acted illegally even though California is a so-called stand your ground state, which provides citizens wide latitude to use force if they are threatened with violence. Although the Golden State has no statute explicitly permitting such violence in the name of self-defense, court cases have made the practice legal there. 

In states like Georgia and Kansas, citizens can use deadly force both in their homes and in public if they believe they are in danger, while more liberal states like Massachusetts and Hawaii require that citizens “retreat” to their homes before using force. 

A California law firm, Werksman Jackson and Quinn, says the state “sits in between these two groups of states.” The firm says Californians have a right to use force in public spaces when “the other person is the initial aggressor” or when they “believed force was necessary” to protect themselves.