# How to organized shoplifters get away (unnoticed by staff) with such extreme theft?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [March 17, 2009, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751 "2009-03-17T14:40:07Z")
**Posts on this page:** 10
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/21 "2009-03-18T01:17:20Z")
> [@Foxy40](#):
>
> I check out a customer service forum every once in a while to read the stories and they are very consistant about not having any authority to accuse or chase a shoplifter outside. They can say “Are you going to pay for that sweater” or whatever..but most say that if the shoplifter responds with “what sweater?” they end up walking out with it.
This reminds of a time last fall. My transportation died. No auto, had to bike everywhere. So I started carrying a backpack with me everywhere I went. Cargo room you see.
Well I went into a Meijer’s to get a 2 liter of pop. Buy it and as I leave I throw out the receipt because why would I want to return a bottle of pop? Well right after I throw the receipt out the greeter goes “you have a receipt for that?”.
“sure” I go and fish the pop receipt out of the trash.
She looks at it. “no the backpack”
Since I bought the backpack many moons ago at a Staples I could safely say I didn’t have a Meijer’s receipt for it. “I brought this from home”
She gave me this glare of “liar” but that was the end of it.
I left thinking how easy it’d be if I actually were a backpack thief.
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/22 "2009-03-18T02:32:38Z")
There’s an old joke about that, about stealing wheelbarrows.
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### Author:  [@Captain\_C](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_C)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/23 "2009-03-18T05:34:49Z")
> [@Keeve](#):
>
> If you can’t even chase the shoplifter when you see it yourself, I’m confused, trying to figure out what they pay you to do. I have only two guesses: (1) You’re there strictly as a deterrent, in the hopes that your presence may scare away some would-be shoplifters. (2) Maybe it is the mall that pays you, and you can intervene in thefts from some of the mall’s stores but not from others?
Both. Regarding the visual deterrent point, most of the time I can just be a jackass and deter shoplifters. You’d be amazed how effective it can be to stand 3" behind someone and grin at them while they are trying to steal stuff. The shoplifter will usually become belligerent and leave, or take a swing at me, in which case I have an excuse to make an arrest for assault.
Regarding the protection of property, by the letter of the law employees of a store have a legal right to detain people attempting to steal their property. Not all stores allow their employees to do this, but the right exists.
Being mall security, I do not have legal ownership over the stores’ property. Malls work much like apartment buildings, stores are tenants of the mall. For example, I ‘own’ the chairs in the common areas, but not the jeans for sale at the Gap.
Therefore it would be illegal for me to detain someone for stealing property I do not own. If a store employee attempts a stop and the shoplifter starts fighting however, I would be able to assist in order to maintain the safety of the store employee. Silly laws that protect shoplifters. Damn people and their civil rights and what-not. 😃 It also doesn’t help I’m working on my master’s degree in policy and administration. I understand the need for such rules, but damn it sucks to have to follow them.
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### Author:  [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2009, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/24 "2009-03-19T06:36:35Z")
Really? You question how oblivious the average American is? Just look at how many drivers and pedestrians are completely unaware of who or what is around them.
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### Author:  [@Pammipoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pammipoo)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2009, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/25 "2009-03-20T16:42:36Z")
My sister manges retail clothing…some of the stories she tells are insane! My favorite is pile grabbing…basically, the thief just runs in the store, grabs as much as they can carry from the tables closest to the door, and run out. Then they return it to other locations, usually for store credit, where they can get clothes they actually want.
I remember her saying there were hardcore restrictions on what they had to do before they could accuse someone of shoplifting, but I dont remember them. I know one was the employee had to actually see the thief conceal the item. Another was they had to get past the security gate before being approched, otherwise they could claim they were planning on paying
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### Author:  [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)
#### Post date: [March 21, 2009, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/26 "2009-03-21T00:08:45Z")
> [@Pammipoo](#):
>
> My sister manges retail clothing…some of the stories she tells are insane! My favorite is pile grabbing…basically, the thief just runs in the store, grabs as much as they can carry from the tables closest to the door, and run out. Then they return it to other locations, usually for store credit, where they can get clothes they actually want.
This is actually one of the benefits behind some of the more advanced RFID systems. Each piece can basically be uniquely identified and shown as sold or not by the computer systems.
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### Author:  [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)
#### Post date: [March 21, 2009, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/27 "2009-03-21T04:43:32Z")
I knew a guy who worked security at a department store and he described an extreme version of the grabbing that **Pammipoo** explained above. A van would pull up to one of the entrances, a bunch of people pre positioned in the store would grab a bunch of stuff and just run out to the van.
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### Author:  [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)
#### Post date: [March 21, 2009, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/28 "2009-03-21T04:57:01Z")
> [@sassyfras](#):
>
> 60 minutes a few years ago had a feature where they showed a gang of El Salvadorenos infiltrate a clothing store. First an english speaker started asking questions to the employee, and somehow the gang of at least 4 others robbe dthe store blindly of enough clothes that they needed a van to get away with it.
>
> So how do they so successfully pull the blinders over the employees of these stores? I can see being distracted for a moment, but totally unawares? Many cases, the staff doesn’t realize anything is wrong until too late. Are these employees incredibly stupid or do the thieves have some kind of magical powers?
It’s not that difficult when they all work together. In our store, here’s what has happened in the past. Someone asks if you have any more oranges in the back room, someone else, unrelated will ask for directions to the airport, they’ll show you their map, since that’s what they were using, but got off course, another person asks another employee where the bathroom is, oh and there’s a mom in the store with 1 or 2 year old twins that are having a loud ass freakin’ hissy fit over god know what and then there is one or two other customers in line at the register. This goes on for about 2 minutes, then you notice something odd…it’s really quiet in the store, and then you realize how loud and chaotic it was just a minute ago…then you realize everyone all kind of left at once…then you realize you’re missing $1000 worth of lobster tails and then person running the register thinks she may have just been quick changed. Dammit.
Yeah, often times you don’t know it’s happening, these people are good at coming in and quickly (but casually) getting all the employees tied up with random questions and creating chaos with something (like crying babies), and then they grab what they can.
The trick is, to be aware of what’s going on before it’s too late. I train my managers to be able to spot this kind of ‘ambush’ and if they notice that things quickly got very hectic (especially if some of the ‘customers’ start asking long winded questions and ESPECIALLY if they pull out a big map and ask for directions and the big map blocks your view of the rest of the store) they know to make sure the back door is locked, the safe is locked and they know where to station themselves to be able to kinda keep an eye on everything. Also, my managers keep their cell phones on them at all times. But shit happens.
So it’s not always that the employees are stupid, it’s that these people know exactly what they’re doing, it’s what they do and they’re good at it.
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### Author:  [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)
#### Post date: [March 21, 2009, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/29 "2009-03-21T22:05:32Z")
The stores will stand for a certain amount of stock loss in this way. If they employed twice as many detectives they could catch twice as many of them, but they won’t.
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### Author:  [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)
#### Post date: [March 21, 2009, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-organized-shoplifters-get-away-unnoticed-by-staff-with-such-extreme-theft/489751/30 "2009-03-21T22:46:04Z")
What exactly is a “no prosecute” policy?
Does this mean there are stores that simply will not get the police involved in shoplifting cases?!
[Eyes his financial prospects, considers a life of crime…]
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