Shop lifting a billion dollar business in New York

 Jeff Charles:

Amid heightened crime rates across the country, shoplifting has become an increasingly popular form of illicit activity. In major cities, there have been organized shoplifting rings terrorizing retail stores and their customers in the face of lax laws regarding these types of crimes.

In New York, the problem has become particularly egregious, and has resulted in a thriving black market on which criminals sell the merchandise they pilfered from major and smaller retailers. Indeed, the Empire State’s shoplifting market has cost retailers billions of dollars each year as this brand of property crime continues.

A shoplifting epidemic costing retailers in New York state $4.4 billion a year is creating a shadow resale economy that ranges from eBay to bodegas, The Post has learned.

Shoplifting in New York City alone rose 64% from June 2019 to June 2023, according to the Council on Criminal Justice.

In 2022, the total estimated loss to shops in the state was $4.4 billion, Gov. Kathy Hochul said in February.

And retailers and law enforcement told The Post that the need to sell the stolen goods has created a sprawling underground economy.

Thieves and middlemen are selling shoplifted goods on resale sites such as eBay and Facebook Marketplace and filling warehouse spaces at illegal pawn shops.

Retailers and members of law enforcement have described an underground network where stolen goods are peddled through a variety of channels. The modus operandi of these theft rings reveals a high level of sophistication in how its members procure, store, and fence the stolen property.

Thieves using detailed “shopping lists” target specific, high-value items such as cellphones, power tools, and others. After swiping these products, the thieves then funnel them through illicit wholesalers across the five boroughs.

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New York lawmakers need to change the laws that the thieves are taking advantage of.  I have not noticed anything like that at local retailers.  In recent years I have been more likely to buy tools from Amazon.