Watch: Looters ransack Apple and Lululemon stores in Philadelphia
More than 100 teenagers swarmed Apple, Lululemon and Foot Locker stores in Philadelphia, making off with clothes and expensive technology.
Some of the looters in the Centre City district were wrestled to the ground by police on Tuesday night. However, officers were vastly outnumbered.
Footage shows hooded rioters piling through the door of an Apple store at around 8pm, grabbing display models as sirens wailed in the background.
“Got one,” someone off camera says, before chanting: “Free iPhone, free iPhone.”
More people run into the glass-fronted building despite warnings that “security” is on the way. One looter in an orange hoodie and mask showed off a handful of iPhones to the camera.
Philadelphia police said in a statement that they pursued looters fleeing from the scene, recovering abandoned iPhones and iPads along the way.
A security guard at a Foot Locker was assaulted, CBS Philadelphia reported.
At the Lululemon store in Rittenhouse Square, police struggled to detain looters fleeing the sportswear shop, laden with stolen clothes.
One person who fled the scene wearing a white skeleton mask and dark clothes is also present in video footage captured in the Apple store.
A couple of rioters staggered outside the shop and were promptly pinned down by police.
One man in a black hoodie was hauled away in a headlock by an officer before being pushed to the ground and punched in the head, as a woman screams and laughs in the background.
Protests took place earlier on Tuesday when a judge dismissed a murder charge against a police officer who shot and killed a 27-year-old driver he had pulled over.
However, several police commanders told CBS Philadelphia that the looting was not connected to earlier demonstrations.
On the same day, discount chain Target announced it was closing nine stores, including three in San Francisco, as a result of theft and crime fears.