Organized retail crime growing, but Ariz. has effective strategies to fight it, law enforcement and industry experts say

Arizona retail leaders and Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell say organized retail crime is growing more pernicious, sophisticated and sometimes violent, but the state is doing a good job of implementing strategies to make thieves think twice. 

Mitchell and industry experts gathered for a recent discussion hosted by the Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry exploring how business and law enforcement can defeat the growing scourge of organized retail crime, which not only affects neighborhoods’ quality of life but also puts upward pressure on consumer prices. 

The event, sponsored by Target and Amazon, was moderated by Arizona Retailers Association Executive Director Michelle Ahlmer and featured remarks from Home Depot’s Andrew Nagy and Amazon’s Brent Cohen in addition to Mitchell. 

The experts said that organized retail crime differs from shoplifting, which is typically defined as merchandise theft for personal use, while organized retail crime relies on “fences,” or third parties that organize and finance thieves’ activities and then resell the stolen merchandise, often to unknowing consumers on online platforms like Offer Up or Facebook. 

The ill-gotten funds not only finance additional thefts, but also fuel other, sometimes transnational, crimes. Mitchell said it is not unusual for thieves to cross state lines in multistate crime waves. 

Also, unlike shoplifting, organized retail crime can compromise the physical safety of customers and store sales associates as thieves become more brazen. 

Tricks of the trade 

Nagy and Cohen said thieves are always working to stay one step ahead of retailers’ attempts to stop theft. Theft strategies include: 

Box stuffing: Thieves remove merchandise from a large box and replace the box’s contents with different, more desirable, more expensive merchandise and proceed to the checkout line, paying the price of the original merchandise. 

Ticket switching: Thieves replace an item’s UPC price tag with a UPC tag from a less expensive item. 

Identity theft: Common in the online space, thieves will use stolen identities and credit card numbers to make purchases. 

Strategies for success 

Nagy and Ahlmer said displaying merchandise behind locked cages and cases can diminish customers’ shopping experience but has proven successful in reducing theft. 

Leveraging technology like facial recognition, radio frequency identification, license plate readers, and denial technology, which prevents a product from working if it hasn’t gone through the regular checkout process, has also proven effective in some jurisdictions, but the panelists acknowledged that once theft, or shrinkage in industry parlance, has been reduced in one merchandise category, thieves will turn their attention to another category. 

Cohen said that customers want a seamless checkout experience and retailers want to deliver, but that retailers “have to inject friction. The criminal element is very smart.” 

It’s better for customers for merchandise to be locked up than to be out of stock, Ahlmer said. 

Law and order 

Ahlmer said Arizona has a good statute on the books for fighting organized retail crime, which her organization is very protective of, as she and her members do not want enforcement to become more onerous or unwieldy in the name of reform. 

Mitchell agreed, citing so-called “bail reform” efforts, which she said can result in thieves quickly returning to criminal acts and can make it easy for criminal bosses to spring their associates from custody. Mitchell said she’ll advocate strongly against any such bail reform efforts at the state Legislature. 

Mitchell said that, unfortunately, not all states and jurisdictions do an adequate job of maintaining criminal records, which can hamstring Arizona’s efforts to secure convictions in cases where there was likely a prior offense. She said Congress could help enforcement efforts by setting a standard for “priors.” 

Mitchell established an anti-organized retail crime task force, and Attorney General Kris Mayes oversees her own task force at the state level. 

“We’re fortunate in Arizona to have not only an AG-led task force, but County Attorney Mitchell’s task force,” Cohen said, adding that Arizona is often recognized among anti-theft professionals for outstanding coordination among law enforcement offices.