Shoplifting has gotten so bad nationally that chains like Rite Aid are closing hard-hit stores, sending terrified employees home in Ubers, and locking up aisles of seemingly mundane items like deodorant and toothpaste. Retailers are already reeling from the pandemic, supply chain woes, and labor shortage.
Now they’re combating systematic looting by organized crime gangs — which are growing more aggressive and violent. “It’s out of control — it is just out of control,” Lisa LaBruno, SVP of operations and innovation at the Retail Industry Leaders Association, tells Axios.
A lot of the uptick is tied to the ease of reselling stolen goods online, plus the fact that consumers are buying more everyday goods online during COVID. “We have experienced a 300% increase in retail theft from our stores since the pandemic began.” CVS spokesman Michael DeAngelis tells Axios.
At a Rite Aid that just closed its doors in midtown Manhattan, more than $200,000 in goods were stolen in December and January, per the New York Post. “They come in every day, sometimes twice a day, with laundry bags and just load up on stuff,” the Post quoted a store employee saying.
According to a recent report from Fox 5 News, A nun who was principal of a Catholic elementary school in California has been sentenced after she stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from the school for her personal expenses and to bankroll her gambling habit, federal authorities said Monday.
Mary Margaret Kreuper, 80, was sentenced to a year and a day in federal prison and ordered to pay $825,338 in restitution, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. Despite her nun’s vow of poverty, the principal of 28 years admitted to stealing $835,339 from St. James Catholic School in Torrance over a period of 10 years to pay for personal expenses that included gambling trips, according to prosecutors.
“On an annualized basis (approximately $83,000 per year), [Kreuper] stole the equivalent of the tuition of 14 different students per year,” prosecutors said. “These funds were intended to further the students’ education, not fund [Kreuper’s] lifestyle.” Meanwhile, The NYPD was searching for the man who ripped a sneaker off a woman’s foot inside a subway station in Brooklyn.
The victim was going up the street staircase at Grand Army Plaza at about 11:05 a.m. on Feb. 9 when the man grabbed the 47-year-old woman’s sneaker off her left foot, said police. The suspect ran into the train station, jumped the turnstile and onto a train. The woman did not suffer any injuries. The suspect was described as a male, black, 20 to 30 years old, 5’10”, 220lbs. He was last seen wearing a gray knit cap, a gray vest, a blue sweater, blue jeans, and white sneakers.
