People have long called shoplifting a victimless crime. Who gets hurt beyond the big-box retailer? As organized retail crime becomes more prevalent, violent and bolder, claims of it being harmless go out the window.
Along with retailers losing tens of billions of dollars a year to organized retail theft, employees have been attacked during “smash and grabs.” Fear then ripples through the stores, and “retail shrink” can result in higher prices for customers.
“These are not victimless crimes, especially in the case where Angelinos are attacked through force or fear,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said.
Law enforcement cracks down
Los Angeles is afflicted more than any other city in the country, according to the National Retail Federation. Like many other cities and states, this year Los Angeles launched a task force to tackle organized retail crime. It features 22 full-time investigators dedicated to the crime.
“Those who commit these crimes will be caught, they will be held accountable, and we will work to address this issue,” Bass said.
In South Florida in October, following a nine-month multi-agency investigation, authorities charged 14 people with stealing more than $20 million in merchandise this year alone.
“It is well-organized, it is profitable, it is criminal. This is the modern-day mafia and criminal organizations that we’re taking down,” Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody said.
But crime rings are like weeds: Pull one and another pops up. So any crackdown needs to get to the root of the problem: How to deter the crime in the first place.
Store solutions
Retailers have tried solutions like locking up items that are most often stolen. That’s done to their own detriment, according to top retail consultant Burt Flickinger.
“Locking up the merchandise can reduce sales by anywhere from 12 to 20% or more,” Flickinger said.
Another option for retailers is checking receipts at the door.
Would that stop you? No, not at all. What, some lady’s gonna, ‘Hey sir, sir!’ By that time, I’ve already got the stuff in my car and while they’re trying to pull up the phone, I’m already out of the parking lot.
KGW news report
Portland’s KGW reporter Kyle Iboshi recently interviewed convicted felon and retail crime ring leader Martin Castaway in prison. Castaway is serving a 7-year sentence for theft.
“Does the presence of a security officer or loss prevention change your decision whether to go into a store or not?” Iboshi asked.
“Not really. If I see a security dude with a gun, I know he can’t touch me,” Castaway replied.
Castaway said he would have second thoughts about shoplifting only if there was a police officer on the scene.
Police as retail security
In one year, police in the greater Tampa, Florida, region logged nearly 17,000 calls to Walmarts. That’s two calls an hour, every hour, every day, according to a 2016 Tampa Bay Times analysis.
In Clearwater, Walmart called police after a man drank a 98-cent bottle of sweet tea in the store without paying. The police response and subsequent jail time cost taxpayers $1,230, the Times reported.
For years, Walmart’s been criticized for putting too much of its security burden on police.
“Instead of treating security as an expense the way most of the rest of retail does, in Walmart’s defense, treat security as an investment the way Target and Kroger and the independents do so well,” Flickinger said.
The Times analysis showed local Walmarts generated four times as many calls as nearby Targets.
Target, which recently closed nine stores around the country over organized retail crime, says they’ve made significant investments in hiring more security team staff and third-party guard services as well as using theft-deterrent tools.
Walmart, meanwhile, announced plans to reopen an Atlanta-area store that was hit by arsonists last year. When the store opens in May, it’ll have a new feature: a police workstation inside.
“If you’re thinking about you’re going to go into this Walmart and do some shoplifting or a robbery or whatever, you see this APD logo, and you’ll say, ‘Eh, not today,’” Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said.
It’s not a solution for every store, and one possible solution isn’t at the store at all.
The online crackdown
The bipartisan INFORM Consumers Act took effect in June. The new law requires online marketplaces to verify and share identifying information on high-volume third-party sellers.
“These scammers are having a heyday, particularly online,” Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) said. “We want to make sure that we eliminate the opportunity for these…defrauders and scammers to be able to sell online and hold these platforms accountable for checking out who the sellers are.”
“It can make a modest difference on the rogue sellers,” Flickinger said, “but no material changes in reducing crime today.”
Community solutions
Flickinger said the real solutions come from the community, like East Harlem’s Abyssinian Development Corporation, a nonprofit born out of the Abyssinian Baptist Church.
The group helped bring Pathmark to a relative food desert and used profits from the lease to reinvest in housing, economic development and social services.
“An area that everybody said was not saveable because the junkies had wrecked it for 40 or 50 years, and in a matter of a few years, it was first a requiem and then a whole East Harlem Renaissance,” Flickinger said.
The renaissance would last less than two decades. Following a building sale, bankruptcy and a spat between development partners, Pathmark shuttered in 2015, leaving residents with few affordable food options.
This is the final installment of a 3-part series on organized retail crime. Here is Part 1 and Part 2.
