‘All you had to do was pay us enough to live’: Employee unhappy with pay from California warehouse, walks into work with a lighter and a grudge

A believed to be a Kimberly-Clark warehouse worker in Southern California has been arrested after allegedly starting a fire in his place of work but surprisingly, many online can see where he’s coming from. Fire crews battled the massive blaze which started in the small hours of Thursday morning but the flames ultimately took down the whole building.

The blaze began some time after 12:30 in the morning according to ABC 7 with a large response from fire crews in the area with 175 firefighters and 20 fire engines showing up to try and put the flames out. The orange glow and smoke could be seen for miles around and footage of the fire filmed by bystanders has already been making the rounds online.

There was only so much that the fire crews could do however and it was clear that the building wasn’t going to survive the raging inferno. Footage from this morning shows that the 1.2 million square foot distribution center had been razed to the ground.

There were around 20 employees in the warehouse filled with paper products when the fire broke out. While one initially went missing all were eventually accounted for. The origin of the fire was quickly determined to be suspicious in nature with the missing person being the main suspect according to police. He was soon found and arrested.

The fire was allegedly started by a disgruntled employee

Local police soon identified 29-year-old Chamel Abdulkarim as a person of interest. While it was initially believed that he was an employee at the warehouse it was later revealed that he worked for NFI Industries which is a third party distributor for Kimberly-Clark. Officers said that it was unknown if he was working when the fire broke out but he was present in the warehouse.

While a motive has not yet been revealed, viral footage online seems to give a pretty clear indication as to why he allegedly started the fire. A clip making the rounds online appears to show Abdulkarim using a lighter to start fires all over the warehouse, lighting up any flammable goods he can find. As he does so he can be heard saying “all you had to do was pay us enough to live.”

The message is pretty clear, the pay is the problem, at least as far as the alleged arsonist is concerned. The man in the video states, “if you’re not gonna pay us enough to f—ing live, or afford to live, at least pay us enough not to do this s—.” He then sets fire to a pallet of toilet rolls.

While plenty condemned Mr. Abdulkarim’s alleged actions, others were sympathetic, “People will condemn the fire (rightfully), but ignore the part where someone feels so disposable they’d burn down their own workplace.” wrote one person on X. Others sympathized but claimed the business likely wouldn’t be affected as it would be covered by insurance.