NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) – The United Bodegas of America (UBA) created a secret society (SecSoc) that works to secure gun carry permits for bodega employees across all of New York City’s five boroughs, the organization announced.
“UBA’s SecSoc will be following the strictest guidelines to obtain carry permits in NYC. Bodega owners are facing extreme life and death situations everyday, they have the right to protect themselves,” UBA said in a statement.
According to UBA, the group will hire Duly Authorized Instructors (DAI) to train SecSoc members before they submit their applications for firearm permits to the NYPD.
DAIs are either military members or former law enforcement officers, and their trainees get eight hours of classroom training and at least two hours at the gun range.
Johnny Nuñez, a retired NYPD officer, is a DAI and told 1010 WINS/WCBS 880 that trainers emphasize the level of personal responsibility one needs to get a gun.
“We say, look, if you’re the type of person that gets caught up in emotion, this is not for you,” Nuñez said.
Fernando Mateo, a spokesman for the UBA, told 1010 WINS/WCBS 880 that it comes down to safety, for both bodega employees and the community.
“We are also the place where people run to in order to seek protection. So we decided to go and get permitted and trained properly in order to carry a weapon,” Mateo said.
He says that if UBA members are carrying, potential criminals will no longer know what they are walking into when they cause trouble in a bodega. Of the minimum 14,000 UBA members, hundreds are carrying guns.
“The brutality Bodega owners have endured in the past 10 years is unlike anything we have seen since the early 70’s. We have lost our businesses, our dignity and our livelihood to criminals," UBA President Radahmes Rodriguez said. "We have been looted, robbed, beaten, stabbed, shot and murdered. The time has come for us to turn the table on the criminals who continue to vandalize our Bodegas.”