Shoplifting

Shoplifting (also known as commercial burglary) is theft of merchandise for sale in a shop, or of money from the cash register of a retail establishment, by an ostensible patron. It is one of the most common crimes for police and courts.

Most shoplifters are amateurs; however, there are people and groups who make their living from shoplifting, and they tend to be more skilled. Some individuals shoplift in an effort to resist selling their labor, and/or to protest corporate power. These individuals target—often exclusively—chain stores; Wal-Mart is an especially popular target for political shoplifters in America. Sainsbury's and Tesco are primary targets in the UK (see Evasion). Some counter this by arguing that costs of theft are not absorbed by the targeted company, but instead may result in price increases.^[1] Therefore, shoplifting is thought to ultimately harm paying consumers, some of whom may be shopping at places such as Wal-Mart because they are poor and have few other options. Shoplifting causes shoppers to pay extra. This counter-argument might be refuted as ""economic hogwash" because a well managed company determines prices and wages via profit maximization regardless of expenses. More discussion of these ideas in can be found here

A common slang term for shoplifting in Australia and the United States is "five-finger discount." The "five-finger" aspect of the term refers to the fact there are five fingers on the hand which is used to grab the stolen merchandise. In the US, it is often referred to as "jacking" or "racking" and in the UK as "nicking" or "chaving." Professional shoplifters or organized shoplifting groups are often referred to as "boosters."

Sneaking into cinemas and not paying bus fare are not covered in this article.

Economic impact and response from shops

Retailers report that shoplifting has significant effect on their bottom line, stating that about 0.6% of all inventory disappears to shoplifters. In 2001 it was claimed that shoplifting cost US retailers $25 million a day. Other observers, however, believe industry shoplifting numbers to be greatly exaggerated. Studies have found that over half of what is reported as shoplifting is either employee theft or fraud. Of course, in apprehended shoplifting, the merchandise is generally recovered by the retailers and there is ofren no loss to the retail store owner whatsoever when the merchandise is surrendered to the store by the suspects. The statistics concernining shoplifting include the recoveries and this is why the Retailers can prepare reports that indicate what type and kind and brand of merchandise is more attractive to amateur and professional shoplifters.

HISTORY OF CIVIL RECOVERY AND SHOPLIFTING

Shoplifting was not always treated as the crime of "stealing" as it is today in the United States. Up until the mid to late seventh decade of the 20th Century in the United States, shoplifting was treated as an "attempt to steal" under city ordinance when the retailers determined that they wanted to press charges against those suspected shoplifters who surrendered the merchandise when confronted by store employees. More often, however, in the case of amateur shoplifters, retail stores just took payment for the merchandise and warned the shoplifters not to attempt to shoplift again under the threat of prosecuting them under the city ordinance for "shoplifting." The theory of due diligence and ordinary diligence in the law provided that retailers had the obligation under the law to protect their private merchandise offered for sale on private property for private gain, as well as the duty to stop all attempts to steal merchandise that were witnessed by store employees.

Under City ordinances, the store owners or their agent employees were responsible for joining the city complaint against the suspected shoplifter and if the complaint failed and the suspect was found not guilty, the retail store was open to a civil suit for false arrest and malicious prosecution under the civil laws of the states. The ordinances, therefore, were of little use to the retailers and were little used by the retailers. Those shoplifters apprehended for the first time in a retail establishment were merely put on a list by the retailer who did have the right under the law to stop and question customers who were suspected of attempting to steal merchandise, Most amateur shoplifters did surrender the "concealed" merchandise with an offer to pay and the stores accepted payment and sent them on their way.

Shoplifting is often a "crime" committed by those in the moral majority who would not think of committing other crimes against the public. The psychologists have been studying shoplifters for years and have different theories as to the mentality and morality of the "amateur" shoplifters and the many different reasons amateur shoplifters advance for their trespass against society. The one reason shoplifting is such a democratic crime may be for the reason that it "looks so easy" and the shoplifter is sure that nobody is looking. Sometimes! and probably rarely, customers who are merely inadvertent are accused of shoplifting when they commit an inadvertent act and exit final checkout points or store premises without paying for store merchandise.

Shoplifting only became the completed crime of larceny (stealing) under law in the United States when the cities began (in the mid to late 70's) to license retail store security personnel with the power of arrest off of store premises or beyond final checkout points. When shoplifters under continuous surveillance exit the premises or the final checkout points with unpaid merchandise in their possession, concealed or otherwise, these shoplifters can be ticketed for "stealing" by commissioned police who are called to the store and who write these tickets on the probable-cause evidence of the city-licensed store security. The retail owner of the merchandise or his agent does not have to join the complaint and it is the city who is responsible for any prosecution of the matter in the City Courts. Suspected shoplifters are not stopped within the stores and asked for payment for merchandise. Instead, they are permitted to exit the stores by the privately licensed Loss Prevention personnel for the purpose of establishing the "intent" to steal that permits the event to be treated as a completed larceny by the courts. Most first offenders are offered plea bargains by the city courts or rehabilitation wherein they can avoid a criminal record. Research of the public records indicate that there is no defense to a ticket for "stealing" in the city courts.

Because all suspects would now be apprehended and ticketed for larceny under the new method of combating shoplifting, and the retailers would lose the sales, in cooperation with the cities and the retailers, and the state authorities, all of the State Legislatures over the past 30 to 40 years have passed some kind of CIVIL RECOVERY statute for the retailers in their states. Under Civil Recovery Statutes, retailers cannot only recover their merchandise, they can sometimes demand the retail price of the merchandise, depending on the statute, and they can always letter demand the damages allowed in the State Statute for the shoplifting event without the burden and expense of filing a civil lawsuit.

Civil Recoveries for shoplifting can be demanded out of view of the courts by demand letters sent to suspected and ticketed shoplifters under the threat of prosecuting the shoplifting event under the Civil Law and statute if the demand isn't met within a certain time period. The appellate courts of a few of the States have ruled that shoplifting cannot be prosecuted as a larceny if the defendant has paid a Civil Recovery to the store. Under the law, it is NOT necessary for the LP Security personnel to call the commissioned police when they witness an attempt to steal because they do not have the same obligation as a Commissioned Officer of the City to report a crime. It is a matter of the policy of the store and thus a mixed practice throughout the United States.

It is said that, in Florida, if the apprehended suspect pays or promises to pay the Civil Recovery Statutory MINIMUM of $200, the retailers do not call the Commissioned Police. It is said that in some jurisdictions in some states, like Arizona, for instance, the Commissioned Police will not travel to the stores to ticket the suspects if the suspects have surrendered the merchandise with an offer to pay. Minimum and maximum damages for civil recovery are established under state laws and vary from minimums of $50 to $200 to maximums of thousands of dollars. Attorney fees are also recoverable, even for the demand letters. Prosecutions in the courts for civil recoveries for shoplifting are almost non-existent because the out-of-court letter demands have been so successful. Civil Recovery Laws are a subsidy for the retailers but this subsidy has not produced a decrease in shoplifting.

According to the 2001 National Retail Security Survey conducted by the University of Florida, retail operations suffered an average annual shrinkage percentage of 1.75% in 2000. Although most retailers experience a shrinkage percentage of less than 2% some smaller retailers often experience monthly and annual average shrinkage percentages as high as 20%. According to a study by the National Retail Security Survey 30.6% of shrinkage comes from shoplifting, 46% from employee embezzlement, 17.6% from administrative error, and 5.8% from vendor fraud. This remains disputed. ^{[citation needed]}

Companies have introduced many technologies to combat shoplifting. Many stores have video cameras filming all areas of the store; larger stores are often patrolled by undercover investigators who are generally licensed by the city police authority. Security devices are often affixed to products that set off alarms at the store exit if they are not deactivated or removed by a cashier. Someone from MIT, who was central to the development of RFID technology, indicated that this new technology would have saved Winono Ryder from her felony shoplifting conviction because the items she was found guilty of stealing would have been automatically debited to her charge account when she took possession of the items. (Winona Ryder offered to pay for these items but the privately-licensed city security guard asnd a private employee of the Retailer, refused payment and initiated a criminal arrest for felony larceny, apparently to stop Winona from spending several thousands of dollars in this store in the future?)

According to the 2004 17th Annual Retail Theft survey conducted by Jack L. Hayes International, 689,340 shoplifters were apprehended by 27 of the major US retailers. This figure was a 4.86% increase from a total of 657,414 shoplifters apprehended in 2003. In 2004. $70,039,564 dollars were recovered from shoplifting apprehensions compared to $68,927,833 in 2003. In 2004, the average dollar value for a shoplifting apprehension was $101.60 dollars. ^{[citation needed]} This report covers only 27 of the MAJOR US retailers. It is not clear as to whether or not the retallers report their Civil Recoveries made outside of the courts to anyone but the Internal Revenue Service but Civil Recoveries sometimes are granted special tax treatment under State and Federal Laws.

A common rationalization for engaging in shoplifting is that items are overpriced and that honestly paying for items serves only to line the pockets of executives, and thus should be considered a form of protest. This argument is allegedly dispelled by the claim that "loss in stores serves only to hurt honest customers with higher prices, as well as possibly already underpaid staff in the form of pay cuts to cover the loss." A refutation of this theory is that these responses are inconsistent with Profit maximization and economically insoluble as in either case: if these solutions would improve the bottom line, they would have already been applied regardless of shoplifting. Further: that the only direct economic impact shoplifting has, is a marginalizing effect on stock prices, and to spur investment in to loss prevention technology and staffing. The Parable of the broken window is applicable to the situation, whereas: the company suffering from "shrink" may redistribute assets, but the loss of the window falls on the companies bottom line and nowhere else.

On many occasions, shoplifters prefer to target larger shops and corporations, since stealing from an ostensibly faceless corporation tends to dehumanise the specific deed, enabling shoplifters to rationalize that they are not really hurting any single individuals. This principle is sometimes called "ethical shoplifting." In rare cases, shoplifting is used as a direct protest, in that it causes an actual loss to the store rather than being merely neutral as with a boycott.

There can be numerous reasons given for shoplifting. Commonly, shoplifters steal high valued items such as beauty products and alcoholic beverages, with the intent of either selling them on for profit or simply taking them for their own use. Shoplifting can also, for those in poverty or who are short of money, be seen as a last resort for obtaining food to survive. There are also smaller groups of people who either simply get a thrill out of stealing, or are kleptomaniacs, or do not want to be seen buying certain "embarrassing" products (e.g. condoms or home pregnancy tests).

==Legal status in Canada and the United States There is no specific offense of "shoplifting" under Canadian law. Instead, shoplifting is covered under the general provisions of the Criminal Code of Canada that deal with theft. According to section 322 of the Code, theft is defined as taking or converting anything fraudulently and without colour of right, with the intent to deprive the owner of it, either permanently or temporarily. If the goods are worth less than $5000 the maximum possible punishment is two years imprisonment and/or $2000 in fines, while if the stolen goods are worth $5000 or more, or are a testamentary instrument, the crime may be punished by imprisonment for up to ten years. For punishment purposes, section 334 of the Code then categorizes theft according to the value and nature of the goods that are stolen. However, first offenders often face only extra-judicial sanctions.

There may still be shoplifting ordinances on the books of some cities but shoplifting, when prosecuted or defended, is prosecuted and defended as the crime of misdemeanor or felony larceny in the United States. All of the States have Civil Statutes for the Retailers governing conduct described as shoplifting, that is criminal when prosecuted under criminal law. Some of the States have special statutes that deal with shoplifting as the crime of larceny and/or fraud and all of the states, one way or the other, have criminal sanctions against shoplifting that is treated as larceny under State and Federal Laws. First offense larcency-shoplifting is generally treated less harshly by the City Courts who have different methods of dealing with first offenders. Some offer rehabilitation in schools, some offer plea bargains to offenses that are not criminal, etc... as a means of not giving first offenders criminal records. If suspects, who have been ticketed for shoplifting by the city police in many of the cities of the United States, want to plead not guilty and are found to be guilty by the lower court judge (the municipal court judge), the case will then come under the jurisdiction of the State court and the defendant will have to defend against the charge of a completed larceny charged by the State. First offense shoplifting arrests are most often deferred from the attention of the judge when first offenders are deterred by the City Prosecutors to city rehabilitation programs or to plea bargains for a lesser public offense that is not a crime under State law.

Rights

Store operator

In the state of California, and in most cases the rest of the United States and other countries, store employees and managers have certain powers of arrest inside the premises of the store to prevent theft of merchandise. Store officials may detain for investigation (for a reasonable length of time), the person whom they have probable cause to believe is attempting to take or has unlawfully taken merchandise. Generally, in the United States, the store employees who detain suspects outside of the store premises are licensed by the city police authority with limited powers of arrest and have the power to initiate criminal arrests and/or civil sanctions, or both, depending upon the policy of the retailer. When detention/arrests are made outside of the store premises by City-Licensed LP Retail employees, the licensed LP Personnel are not authorized to accept payment for the merchandise or to permit the suspect to return to the retail section of the store to pay for the merchandise. Generally, the Retail Loss Prevention Personnel will initiate a probable cause arrest or ticket by the commissioned police and later, a civil recovery or, depending on the policy of the retailer, only a civil recovery as permitted under the State Statute for Civil Recovery.

In the state of California, merchants may conduct a limited search to recover the item by those authorized to make the detention. Only packages, shopping bags, handbags or other property in the immediate possession of the person detained may be searched, but not any clothing worn by the person because this would require a search warrant under the law. Licensed security police in the United States can, under the law, ask suspects to VOLUNTARILY empty their purses, pockets, wallets, handbags, etc. and most first offenders and amateur shoplifters generally agree to do this when suggested. Obviously, licensed Security Personnel wait until the Commissioned Police are present to suggest this voluntary action in order to establish witness to the volunteer actions of the suspects and to avoid any charges of unlawful search.

A main fear of a store operator is an accused shoplifter might press charges on the business or the owner. Even if the accused had stolen from the establishment, the business may still run the risk of a lawsuit due to variables that may have occurred during the entire process. That is why many large franchises have very strict guidelines on how to handle shoplifters. However, with the new surveillance technology and chips in merchandise, and the detention of suspects outside of final checkouts, instead of inside of the stores, lawsuits against retailers for unlawful arrest are almost nonexistent. The cities who have policies that permit the commissioned police to respond to the retail security offices of the stores, even when the merchandise is surrendered with an offer to pay for the merchandise, have assumed the responsibility to ticket/arrest shoplifting suspects and have insulated the retailers from suits for false arrest and malicious prosecution. A Search of the Public Records will indicate that suits against retailers have become rarer every year since shoplifting was changed from an attempt to steal, prosecuted upon the complaint of the owner of the merchandise, to the crime of larceny, prosecuted by the people.

Accused shoplifters rights

An accused shoplifter has rights that protects him or her from being falsely detained. An accused is subject to many of the same rights as would be present in an arrest from sworn law enforcement, such as the right to remain silent. In the United States, non-uniformed LP personnel who are licensed by the city police authority and who keep their badges in their pockets do not appear to warn suspects that they have the right to remain silent when they first approach and detain suspects outside of store premises, even though LP Personnel may have already called the commissioned police, and even though LP knows that they will initiate a criminal sanction in the form of an arrest or a ticket to the suspect by the city commissioned police. Generally, the licensed security ask no direct questions of the suspect and make no accusations upon arrest/detention outside the store premises and request only that the suspect return to the store security office for an interview. Because these city-licensed retail security personnel have limited powers of arrest granted by the city police authority, shoplifters can be forcibly detained under the law if they do not cooperate with the retail private security and return to the retail security office to be interviewed. Because shoplifters are under constant surveillance from the moment they commit the act of concealment or fraud within the retail store until they are approached outside of the stores the privately-licensed undercover security police almost never "falsely" detain suspects because they already have the evidence and probable cause to detain the suspect. Generally, the suspected shoplifters recognize the authority of the private security and volunteer incriminating excuses and statements but agree to peacefully accompany the store security police back to the store security offices to be interviewed and held until the Commissioned Police arrive to write a probable cause City ticket for "stealing" - or until the Manager of Security releases the suspects under other terms such as Civil Recovery Authority, as determined by the policy of the retail store and/or the local authorities.

Some shoplifters may be violent and threaten Loss Prevention Investigators with needles or other items and these persons are dealt with more harshly.

Unfortunately, in the United States, because shoplifters are allowed to exit the premises or final checkouts without paying for merchandise and without being asked to pay for merchandise, more suspected shoplifters resist arrest by private security. who wear no uniforms of authority, when they are detained/arrested outside of store premises. There have been many injuries and deaths of shoplifters outside the premises of the retailers because of excessive force in the private parking lots and on the sidewalks of retail establishments in the United States as reported by US Press and media. (A young father died in the parking lot of one of America's largest retailers because he was observed when changing the price sticker from one package of diapers to another and then approached and forcibly detained by LP personnel outside in the parking lot adjacent to the store before the commissioned police arrived.)

A shoplifter in the Canada may have to pay Loss Prevention fees, which can be around 100 pounds to cover the costs of the Loss Prevention officers who caught the shoplifter. If the shoplifter damaged the product he stole, for example removing a security tag, shoplifter will have to pay back the cost of the product too. In Canada this is called Civil Loss Recovery, and the shoplifter will not have a criminal record of any kind, they will just have to pay back money for wasting Loss Preventions' time. The shoplifter will also be banned from the store, and if they come back they could be charged with trespassing.

False imprisonment is the unlawful restraint of someone that affects the person’s freedom of movement. Both the threat of being physically confined and actually being physically confined can be considered false imprisonment if the customer is not free to leave. A store that performs receipt checks may not perform an arrest if a customer refuses to have their receipt checked. In the United States, some of the big discount warehouse stores don't bag or box purchased items and make receipt checks and sight checks of the merchandise at the exit doors and this acts as both prevention of shoplifting by customers and checks on their cashiers. Customers cooperate with this practice but the warehouse stores generally also hire undercover city-licensed security and provide advanced technology to deal with "shoplifters" who have concealed merchandise on their person or their personal belongings that is not presented at final checkouts for payment.

Anti-shoplifting options

Closed circuit television

CCTV monitoring is an important anti shoplifting method. Retailers focusing on loss prevention often devote most of their resources to this technology. Unfortunately if no one is specifically watching the cameras you will only find out at the end what was stolen and not apprehend the shoplifter at the time of theft. CCTV is very effective if used in conjunction with EAS as the EAS system will alert of a potential shoplifter and the video will provide amble proof to procecute. shoplifter and the EAS

Electronic article surveillance

Electronic article surveillance is second only to CCTV in popularity amongst retailers looking for inventory protection. EAS refers to the security tags that attach to a garment and cause an alarm to sound on exiting the store. Regularly, even when an alarm does sound, a shoplifter walks out casually and is not confronted if no guards are present. This is due to the high number of false alarms, especially in malls, due to "tag pollution" whereby non-deactivated tags from other stores set off the alarm. This can be overcome with newer systems and a properly trained staff. Some new systems either dont alarm from "tag pollution" or they produce a specific alarm when a customer enters the store with a non-deactivated tag so that store personal can remove or deactivate it so it does not produce a false alarm when exiting the store.

Phony shoppers

Loss Prevention personnel will patrol the store acting as if they are real shoppers. They may try on merchandise and browse the racks, all the while looking for signs of shoplifting and looking for possible shoplifters. Many large retail companies utilize this technique, and will watch a shoplifter conceal an item then stop them after they have exited the store.

Uniformed guards

The presence of uniformed guards acts as a deterrent to shoplifting activity and they are mostly used by high end retail establishments.

Exit inspections

Shoppers in some large stores cannot leave the premises until cart contents are checked against the register tape. In most of the US, shoppers are under no obligation to accede to a search unless the employee has reasonable grounds to suspect shoplifting.^[2]^[3]

Close customer service

Floor attendants are instructed to greet, follow, and offer help with customer shopping. Shoplifters are not comfortable with this attention and will go somewhere else where they can work unnoticed.

BOB mirrors

Bottom of basket mirrors are commonly used in grocery stores where the checkout lanes are close together and the cashier might be unable to see the entire basket to ensure payment of all items.

Locked merchandise

Some merchandise will be in a locked case requiring an employee to get items at a customer's request. The customer is either required to purchase the merchandise immediately or it is left at the checkout area for the customer to purchase when finishing shopping. This prevents the customer from having a chance to conceal the item.

Another way of locking merchandise, especially popular in liquor stores, is to place a secure, store-administered hard-plastic cap on a regular bottle top. Once purchased the clerk will remove the cap with a store key. It is not otherwise easily removable.

Personnel policy

The choice of store and security personnel can strongly affect the ability of shoplifters to succeed. All personnel must be trained in the techniques shoplifters use to steal merchandise and the proper actions to take.

Famous cases

A famous legal case involving shoplifting occurred in 2001 when actress Winona Ryder was arrested for shoplifting at Saks Fifth Avenue department store in Beverly Hills, California. Ryder was eventually convicted of misdemeanor theft and vandalism and will be eligible for espungement of the conviction after finishing probation. Ryder was originally convicted by a jury of felony larceny/vandalism and was sentenced in a nationally televised California Superior Court proceeding in December of 2002. ^[4] In 2003, Will & Grace actress Shelley Morrison (who played Rosario Salazar) was arrested for shoplifting at a Robinsons-May store in California; the charges were later dropped. In early 2006, former White House aide Claude Allen was arrested for an alleged return scam at a Target store in Gaithersburg, Maryland. Jean Eaton, while mayor of Albert Lea, MN, was accused of stealing hundreds of dollars worth of clothing from Marshall Field's stores in Rochester, Edina and St. Cloud in an alleged clothing swap scam. Eaton had claimed that police acted illegally when they executed a search warrant that gathered evidence used to support a felony theft charge against her. Eaton later reached a plea agreement with Olmsted County prosecutors to have the felony charges dropped, by entering into an adult diversion program, which includes restitution, and possible community service.

'Atypical Theft Offenders'

Some shoplifters (who are almost invariably, and erroneously, labelled as suffering from kleptomania) are persons who clinical investigator Dr. Will Cupchik has labelled 'Atypical Theft Offenders.' These usually honest persons may steal in response to personally meaningful losses and/or other stressors. His book, Why Honest People Shoplift or Commit Other Acts of Theft (2002) provides data and conclusions of two studies conducted by Dr. Cupchik, as well as assessment and treatment methods. The major reasons that these persons should not be labelled as kleptomaniacs are that there are virtually always external triggering events identified as having preceded the theft activity, and because the stealing is virtually always an act of vengeance carried out in anger (although seldom recognized as such by the offender). The existence of an external trigger and the feelings of anger and desire for vengeance are factors that, according to the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, would exclude the diagnosis of 'kleptomania.'

A small number of shoplifters may be influenced by their use of benzodiazapene medications.^[5]

Shoplifting in popular culture

Morrissey, along with his band The Smiths, wrote a song entitled "Shoplifters of the World Unite," with a pro-shoplifting theme.

Characters in the movie Garden State returned an unbought set of cutlery for a forty dollar refund.

Green Day has a song called Shoplifter. It is a B-Side to their American Idiot single.

References

^ http://www.nrf.com/content/press/release2002/costshoplifting.htm
^ http://www.lps1.com/bw.digg.html
^ http://www.die.net/musings/bestbuy/
^ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/3821355.stm
^ Williams R, Dalby JT. (1986). "Benzodiazepines and shoplifting". International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology. 30: 35-39.