Target has a fearsome reputation on the internet regarding how far it goes to stop shoplifting. As is commonly told, it is supposed to track repeat small time shoplifters until they have one last theft that puts them over $1000 (or whatever the magic felony amount is) and only then does Target drop the net and get the shoplifter convicted on a felony for the total amount that has been stolen over weeks or months as one charge.
As the story is told, it smells strange to me and creates many, many followup questions in my mind. I think those questions would be answered by reading through a court case. As famous as Target is, I feel like more dedicated online crime news followers would know of the case and how it played out. Can anyone point me at it?
Edit: The tale told here.
Target has their own crime lab. No joke.
Thanks, but not relevant to my question.
It is relevant to your question, even if it’s not an answer.
Yea it contributes to widen the conversation so, yeah not a direct answer, but it has value in this kind of forum. I’m cool with it.
Given the number of people this law firm has represented and the fact that for the most part they were not prosecuted for felony theft according to this article, my guess is that it happens sometimes but isn’t standard practice.
my guess is that it happens sometimes
I just want to see one case.
I’ve been trying to Google it and haven’t come up with anything. It’s been literally article after article of “ex-target” employees making the claim. Might mean it’s an old wives tale they spread around to each other. Might be that it actually does happen infrequently (probably to repeat offenders who don’t get caught in the act but do get caught when footage is reviewed).
I’m not sure but this is why I stop at $999 at each Target and find a new target.
Gamer
First thousand’s free. Yep, genius policy. (Which is why I doubt they do this).
I have heard this same story except with employers tracking employees who steal money. That one makes a lot more sense to me because they know the identity of the person involved.
Someone gonna tell me that the second I walk into Target their system is like “here comes Mr. Scara Bic, currently at $570.” ??
Thanks, Satan’s Maggoty Cumfart, I know I can always count on you.
What the fuck did you just call me?
Reliable, I think.
Oh, okay.
The internet can be extra silly sometimes lol
I think those would be multiple misdemeanors not one felony.
That is just one of the things that seems very off to me about the claim.
If it’s consecutive incidents of the same transgression it think it’s seen as a spree, like one crime carried out in pieces. It makes sense from a legal reasoning point of view.
It depends on the state, but they often can be combined to add up to a felony.
Jaywalk enough times and they’ll get you for murder
You could try court records in various states, but Florida has some of the most complete and easily accessible court records online. Try Miami-Dade or Orange county records and start searching.
As infamous as Target’s stoploss is, I figured people more plugged in would already know where to look.
In addition to the daily dot arricle, Business Insider also has one:
If you want to read a court case in detail, that will take some work. Maybe someone on Lemmy has found one.
Maybe someone on Lemmy has found one.
And so, my question.
I’ve seen the claim about Target online for years now, sometimes even with people in comments saying they know someone (or know someone who knows someone) that this happened to, but even after all this time no easily found court case. Nobody who ever says they have first hand knowledge ever comes back to say what case it is. It seems like this would be a slamdunk piece of content for one of the various YouTube channels that covers legal drama, but I haven’t seen it. None of the news articles covering Target’s Judge Dredd tier stoploss ever have an update linking to a case. I just want to see it.
I got all of you thieves. I think I might look shady or at least like someone that is going to steal. It’s prolly cause of my demeanor, behaviors, attire, and tattoos. I also act pretty weird when I’m by myself, so that’s when it usually happens. On a few occasions when I felt like I was being followed, I have tested it by going in directions that another shopper likely wouldn’t go in. Yep, I get followed. They send a stock person to the aisle to move shit around. Like the Publix macaroni really needed to be neatly replaced. Sometimes they make it evident that they are watching me at the self checkout scanner like a warning. They stand at the end. Why are they getting paid to stand there just as I showed up? Hmm. Now that I think about it, I have a good idea for a YT channel. I’d wear a discrete body camera every time I go shopping alone and post myself getting following or warned.
If you see me in the store, I got their attention, so you can go at all the good stuff. If there is a Target security person in here, from what I’ve heard people confess to me, the ones that are stealing are the ones you would least profile: middle-class light-skin women that appear aloof. They’re only running half the shit thru the self checkout scanner. If you catch them, “Oops! I must have not been paying attention. Silly me.” I’m not stealing shit. I know I have eyes on me everywhere I go.
Not for nuthin’ but I’d subscribe to that channel!
Right‽ I think it’s a great idea. I am going to look into it. I need to figure out what kind of camera I can use, but also need to consider the ethics with it. I don’t think people would appreciate me posting them on the internet without their consent, especially if it is with negative connotation. The public can go on a manhunt and hurt people’s lives when they may have just been having a bad day, following orders, or their behaviors were misinterpreted. If anything, I’d likely blur out their faces to protect their identity.
Thanks for the encouragement 🙂
Most editing software can blur faces. Problem solved.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Target/comments/1aiualn/how_does_target_keep_track_of_people_stealing/
Someone who claims to be Target LP goes into some interesting detail about their loss prevention, and doesn’t bring this up, in a context where it seems likely that they would have, if it were accurate.
I don’t think they want to publicize every aspect, since this would likely give a distasteful kind of vibe. Doesn’t mean they don’t do it. I’m not saying they do, but not including it in an exposé is not exactly conclusive that it’s false. Am I making sense?
It also might make sense that they don’t want to give details about exactly when people are successfully prosecuted, so they don’t give a new guideline of how to skirt around the rules.
I recall Valve has effectively acted the same way about anti-cheat; they tend not to go into detail about how some new release works, and will silently collect data on who they know to be cheaters for a long time.
Perfect sense. I don’t think that’s any kind of official expose by Target, only one person talking about their experience. But you’re right that it’s not conclusive one way or another.
Agreed.
So, you’re asking if there is a shoplifter whose small-dollar.spree was stopped by target, who was then arrested by the police, who then refused an initial plea offer from the DA, who was then charged by a grand jury, refused a pre-trial plea offer, went to trial, refused the pre-verdict plea offer, and was then found guilty?
Well, what about someone who hit 60k over 120 visits?
(edit: shortened url.)
Yes, finally. This is exactly the kind of case I’m looking for. Now I can dig into the details of the court documents.
But whyyy
It interests me.
We’re the Internet people. Hehe
Jeez. In that case it wasn’t someone poor just trying to get by, she was running a business. She sold the merchandise.
Does anyone else feel like 3 years is way too lenient? That kind of greedy shit should send the person away for like a decade.
Lol, America has more legal slaves than it did before the civil war and has higher incarceration rate than anywhere and you want to lock someone up for a decade for non-violent property crime where the only victim is a multibillion dollar corporation that she stole less than 100k from.
https://violationtracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/target Here’s records of target having stolen 185 million dollars mostly from the American public, how long do you think anyone was in prison for that? Do you think any penalty there even meaningfully affected any executive or major shareholders life?
OK see maybe you need to go to school and learn how law works. You can’t have punishments vary based on the merit of the victim.
Here it’s Target, a rich company, somewhere else it’s a private citizen being stolen from, or a small family business, or a charity. The punishment as a deterrent needs to be based on the act alone, and not your personal lack of sympathy for the victim.
Sorry but the real world doesn’t treat law the way you seem to think.
What the fuck are you talking about? Stealing from a corporation and stealing from people is absolutely not the same. Corporations are not people I can’t believe we still have to argue this point.
Also of course the law takes the merit of the victim into account. Half of all homicide victims are black but in 75% of executions for homicide the victim was white. And how many of those do you think were homeless or sex workers? Don’t be ridiculous, the law is not applied equally for victims or for defendants. Assaulting a cop, on duty or not is not treated the same as assaulting a BIPOC sex worker. Every goddamn time there’s a mass shooting or another cop kills another black person why is the first thing they do to try to find some evidence of dirt on the victims regardless of the relevance to the actual case. You are living in a dream world.
Also… What the hell are you coming at me for about this? I never even argued the ACTUAL SENTENCING was unreasonable?!? (I think it’s unjust, but not unreasonable, but I said nothing of that in my comment). I just thought it was batshit insane that you were out for blood for this person and felt they should go away for half a fucking generation for “grand shoplifting”
You are arguing from an emotional perspective, and also bulldozing in a handful of unrelated topics that you clearly need to rant about. I am not saying I necessarily disagree with you on the specifics, but I was commenting purely from a legal reasoning standpoint. That is a very specific and distinctive principle, or I should say, set thereof. I have heard your type of argument a thousand times, and I am not saying you are WRONG, but I am saying you are not speaking in terms of law, but that of emotional reaction.
It’s fine, I don’t want to argue with you… My initial comment was one kind of discussion, and you’re arguing an entirely different kind.
This one is for both Kerri and Drew: learn to fucking read so you understand what your even arguing about. Which really i don’t even care where you both stand because neither one of you read the link that sparked your argument. How the fuck do you get to the conclusion that Target has stolen $185 million from the American people?!?!
Its honestly hilarious to me that both of you are so engaged in this whole shitshow accusation of ridiculous and emotionally arguing.
I feel left out so ima yell the rest of this response to fit in lol RARARARA. NO RARARARARA. WTF ARE TALKING ABOUT. RARARARA YOUR EMOTIONAL. RARARARA NO YOUR EMOTIONAL
NOTHING IN THE VERY SIMPLE, VERY LEAN, VERY INFORMATIVE INFOGRAPHIC DESIGNED TO GIVE POTENTIAL EMPLOYEES AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE COMPANY THEYRE DEALING WITH.
THE ENTIRE LINK THAT THAT IGNITED THIS GRADE A BITCHFIT BETWEEN YOU TWO DOESNT HAVE A SINGLE FIGURE THAT SHOWS ANYTHING CLOSE TO WHAT THE TWO OF YOU ARE GOING ON ABOUT. THE ENTIRE THING IS A LIST OF FUCKING FINES PAID FOR REGULATORY VIOLATIONS OVER THE ENTIRE DURATION TARGET HAS BEEN IN BUSINESS ACCROSS EVERY LOCATION. DO EITHER OF YOU EVEN KNOW WHERE $187 MILLION STANDS IN COMPARISON TO COMPARABLE COMPETITORS? COMPARED TO A AMOUNT PAID IN FINES PER EMPLOYEE?
Thanks this has been truly fun. 🍻
What meds have you just tossed back with a bourbon chaser? You are the one going off the deep end, fella. I merely stated my opinion about something from a purely legal-reasoning perspective and this person got all in a huff and ranted at me - not comprehending what I had said. And now you’re doubling down on that person’s incredulity and outrage. And the sad part is that evidently neither of you have grasped my one very distinct point, and instead have inferred some huge argument in which I never partook.
Really folks, please stay off the really heavy substances when conversing online. You’re both acting like screaming petulant children. I suspect I’m older than you both combined, no surprise there.
Please just let this die. Nobody is making the effort to read thoroughly and ASK to understand what I had been saying, instead you continue with your incorrect assumptions and attack those assumptions. That’s called a straw man argument, and you both could fill a scarecrow field.
