In little more than two hours Thursday night, four individuals were arrested for retail theft at The Freshgrocer at 4001 Walnut Street, in three separate incidents.
Two of the accused thieves are College junior Marc Fenichel and Wharton junior Peter Fukunaga.
According to police reports, Fukunaga and Fenichel were observed by a manager at The Freshgrocer taking packaged sushi off of the shelves, eating it and then placing the empty containers back on the shelves.
The two allegedly attempted to leave the store shortly after 2 a.m. without paying.
The value of the sushi was reported as $13.40.
Neither Fenichel nor Fukunaga dispute the charge that they were eating sushi off of the shelves.
"Me and one of our frat brothers was walking around eating sushi in the store," Fukunaga said. "We were just shopping, looking for stuff." Both men are in Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity.
Fenichel contends that the pair had every intention of paying for the sushi and did not attempt to leave the store.
"We were plucked out of the aisle while we were looking at other stuff," Fenichel said. "We were asked if we had money to pay for it and we did."
After they were stopped by security guards, Fenichel and Fukunaga were arrested by University Police and were taken to the Philadelphia Police Department's 18th District Headquarters at 55th and Pine for processing.
In other incidents that same night, 19-year-old Stewart Wilkinson, who is not affiliated with the University, was arrested shortly after 1 a.m. for allegedly eating and drinking items in the store without paying for them.
At 11:50 p.m., 23-year-old Shaluta Green was arrested for allegedly attempting to leave the store without paying for four bottles of liquid soap and a disposable douche.
