San Diego woman goes to Nordstrom for squishies. Then she says a man started chasing her in the store: ‘Be super diligent’

As far as social outings go, a trip to the mall is about as low-stakes as it gets. Ideally, the biggest challenge a person should face on such an outing is deciding which products to buy.

But for one San Diego shopper, a quick stop for a kids' toy turned into a genuinely frightening encounter with a stranger.

‘We literally went to get squishies'

California content creator Leah Gwenn (@leahgwenn) shared a warning to other women in San Diego after an unsettling experience at the Fashion Valley mall. Her video has since accumulated more than 473,000 views.

“This is a PSA to every girl who lives in San Diego,” Gwenn said. “If you're going to Fashion Valley Mall, go with somebody, or like a man … We literally went to Geppetto's to get squishies, and then we walked out because they didn't have any. So we went into Nordstrom's, and we realized, okay, we're being followed by this guy.”

Gwenn said the man had AirPods in and appeared to be recording her and her friends. She managed to snap a photo of the man in one of the stores. Then, she saw him approach another man in the same store as them.

“So it was multiple of them,” she said. “He started chasing us around really fast, and it was really scary.”

Gwenn said Nordstrom employees “handled it really well,” and that mall security escorted her and her friends to their car.

“It's just a reminder to be super diligent of your surroundings,” Gwenn said. “There [were] a lot of pretty girls there alone, so be careful, guys. And if anybody knows what it means when they're following you and they have AirPods in, let me know … It sounds like it's [human] trafficking.”

Are malls hot spots for human trafficking?

Several of Gwenn's viewers seemed to agree with her trafficking theory in her comment section, with one commenter writing that “SD is in the top 13 cities in the US for human trafficking.”

This is partially correct, as the San Diego County government website does say “the FBI consistently ranks San Diego as one of the 13 worst human trafficking regions in the U.S. with up to 8,000 victims per year.” Trafficking is also San Diego's second-most profitable “underground economy,” after drugs. However, law enforcement and trafficking researchers caution against the narrative that traffickers frequent malls.

According to Metro Parent, Michigan State Police 1st Lt. Michael Shaw addressed a wave of similar viral claims. He bluntly said that stranger-abduction-style human trafficking at malls and big-box stores “is not an issue at all.” He explained that people reporting suspicious behavior in stores were far more likely to be scoped out for theft than trafficking.

@leahgwenn #greenscreen #fashionvalley #sandiego #PSA #traffickingawarenes ♬ original sound – leah

Trafficking hoaxes versus the real thing

Patch also reported that Simon Property Group, which manages numerous malls, found no credibility to a similar viral claim at New Jersey malls.

“Claims of possible sex traffickers following shoppers have circulated on various social media sites for years,” Patch wrote. “Internet fact-checking website Snopes has either disproven or been unable to verify dozens of similar stories from a variety of stores and states. In fact, the hoax is so pervasive the website has given the topic its own category.”

Separately, Rolling Stone reported on a 2020 viral TikTok trafficking hoax centered on Target. The publication noted “there's a long-established genre of ‘stranger danger' stories focused on abductors of women and children at malls stemming all the way back to the 1950s.”

According to The Conversation, “trafficking survivors often experience violence at the hands of someone they know, not a complete stranger.”

Gwenn was, however, correct to prioritize the safety of her and her friends by seeking support from staff and security.

Buzz News has reached out to Gwenn via email.