The shocking arrests took place just before B.C. dropped its face covering mandate, only to soon yo-yo back in a new one for the fully vaxxed and un-vaxxed alike.

In this full report you will see both the calm discussion the shoppers were having with Blenz staff after being refused service, and the angry customer who saw it necessary to call police to come save everyone from the barefaced shoppers.

“I am not resisting arrest!” yelled Alyosha Zeifman, an independent journalist who went from filming the interaction while maskless, to being gripped by the neck and taken down by two officers. Zeifman’s friends, Darren Urtesky and Lisa Di Fonzo, looked on in shock and pleaded for the officers to stop, without realizing that they were next on the officers’ takedown list.

Watch this video to see how quickly the police escalated the situation to the point of arresting the three individuals, and let us know your thoughts in the comments.

Being arrested after shopping without a mask is rare in B.C., but not unheard of. Through our Fight the Fines civil liberties project, in partnership with the Democracy Fund, Rebel News is currently fighting the criminal charges of five young adults who were also arrested by Coquitlam RCMP after shopping in a Chapters with their full faces exposed.

To help us continue to provide free legal counsel to what has now become thousands of Canadians fined or charged due to COVID-19 restrictions, please donate what you can at FightTheFines.com.