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NY Target employee charged with theft from store www.privateofficer.com
WHITE PLAINS NY Nov 29 2010 — A Target employee who apparently couldn’t wait for Black Friday sales was arrested Wednesday after police said store security told them she ‘d been giving herself discounts since October.
Nichol Alcaide, 21, of 2 Eastview, White Plains, was charged with petty larceny, a misdemeanor.
Target security told police that Alcaide marked down and bought several items without permission on several occasions since October, costing the store $764.71.
She was released on $500 bail and is due in City Court on Monday.
Source:LoHud.com
US Marine stabbed trying to stop shoplifter www.privateofficer.com
Augusta, GA Nov 29 2010 A U.S. Marine is home after suffering a stab wound during the Black Friday shopping holiday. Corporal Phillip Duggan was stabbed while trying to stop Tracey Attaway after investigators say he tried to shoplift from Best Buy.
”Corporal Duggan is in good spirits, tonight. I spoke to him earlier…he said he got a few stitches a couple x-rays but he is fine..he’s at home..and glad that he had his fellow Marines by his side this afternoon,” his friend Larry Frelin said. “The best I could do was try to hold his legs, he was strong, amazingly strong.”
Larry Frelin was right with Corporal Phillip Duggan and other U.S. Marines as they tried to stop Tracey Attaway from running.
“One of the corporals dressed in blues he jumped on him,” said Frelin.
The Marines were all outside raising donations for Toys For Tots when they heard the commotion.
Tracey Attaway is now charged with Armed Robbery, Aggravated Assault, and Possession of a Knife During the Commission of a Crime, after investigators say he pulled a knife on an Best Buy employee while attempting to shoplift two cameras and laptop.
“The two of them started taking him down he ended up pulling a knife swinging around and hitting the corporal in the back,” explained Frelin.
Deputies arrested Attaway shortly after.
From the squad car, Attaway called out to our cameras: “I need something to drink bad man, I’m about to dehydrate.”
As a former Marine himself, Frelin says a fast reaction when danger is present is built into their training. However, he wasn’t expecting a stabbing while trying to raise funds for kids who don’t have toys: “I didn’t expect this type of day heading towards the holidays. It’s just strange, I mean, maybe it would happen in a bigger city…but here in Augusta?”
Corporal Duggan was treated for a non-life threatening stab wound in the middle of his back close to his spine. He is expected to be okay.
Shoplifting being taken serious by prosecuters www.privateofficer.com
Cowlitz County WA Nov 29 2010 The holiday shopping — and shoplifting — season officially begins today.
Would-be shoplifters beware: Although the majority of Cowlitz County shoplifting cases still are prosecuted as third-degree theft, a misdemeanor, a growing number are being prosecuted as a felony. This trend is the result of national push for tougher laws aimed at organized retail crime, and it can mean lengthy prison sentences for what may sometimes be regarded as petty crime.
Nationally, retailers estimate they lose $15 billion to $30 billion a year to theft, and in 2006 the Washington Legislature moved against what it called “bold, violent and extremely organized” shoplifting.
Lawmakers made it permissible to charge someone with “organized retail theft”— a felony — for shoplifting with an accomplice, stealing at least $750 in goods from two or more stores within six months or possessing at least $750 worth of stolen retail items with an accomplice. The Legislature also made it a felony to shoplift three or more stores within six months, trying to thwart security systems or leaving by an emergency exit. Since 2006, such crimes can be charged as “retail theft with extenuating circumstances.”
“The Legislature gave us a bigger hammer, basically,” Cowlitz County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Michelle Shaffer said last week. “This allows us to get the worst of the offenders, the repeat offenders, the people who rove in shoplifting gangs and hit a bunch of stores over the course of several days or months.”
Suspects like David Eurich — if authorities can ever catch him again.
Notorious suspect
In the first half of 2007, Eurich acquired a notorious reputation among Longview merchants and police. Between Jan. 26 and July 6, police repeatedly arrested the Kelso-area transient on suspicion of shoplifting from Fred Meyer (twice), Ross, WinCo, Bob’s Sporting Goods, Your Market Place and the 15th Avenue Safeway. Police said he faked a seizure every time to avoid being taken to jail.
The Cowlitz County Prosecutor’s Office charged Eurich, 39, with a barrage of felonies and misdemeanors, including three counts of retail theft with extenuating circumstances and two counts of second-degree burglary.
Eurich disappeared after the July 2007 arrest and has never gone to trial on the charges. Two bench warrants are outstanding for his arrest.
Despite dramatic cases like Eurich’s, local defense attorneys question whether prosecutors are too quick to charge shoplifters with felonies.
“A lot of cases could be better handled as misdemeanors,” said defense attorney John Hays, noting that it costs taxpayers more to prosecute and punish felons.
He said it wasn’t the Legislature’s intent “to give enhanced punishment to a drug addict who shoplifts a $20 item at Penney’s, then goes to Sears and shoplifts a $20 item, then goes to the Bon and shoplifts a $20 item.”
Most of the shoplifting suspects charged with felonies in Cowlitz have been accused of shoplifting at multiple stores or clipping off security tags. Penalties have varied, with some defendants getting the same sentence they would have gotten for misdemeanor theft. A cluster of recent felony shoplifting convictions, for example, resulted in jail sentences ranging from 15 days to a month.
The difference, though, is that those people now get felonies on their records instead of misdemeanors.
Merchants keep watch
So far, the threat of felony-level sentences hasn’t seemed to reduced shoplifting, according to small retailers like Jim Springer, co-owner of Toys and Treasures at Kelso’s Three Rivers Mall.
“As far as pursuing people who shoplift, whether under the old law or the new law, I’m the kind of person who feels you should make an example of everybody who steals,” Springer said. “We can’t let these people feel they can get away with it.”
“I can’t figure out why anybody would want to steal, especially with the stricter laws against stealing,” said Scott Pollard, manager of Lighthouse Gifts at the mall. “When you steal, it hurts the merchants enough to raise their prices.”
Shoplifting rates have remained steady despite the recession. Police and retailers say the hard times aren’t driving people to thievery.
“We don’t see a correlation between socioeconomic status and the rate of theft,” said Kelso Police Capt. Darr Kirk. “Just because somebody is poorer than someone else doesn’t mean they’re more likely to steal.”
Erna Surls, area supervisor for six Hickory Farms stores, agreed that the people who are in need are not the ones doing the stealing.
“It’s the addicts,” she said. “They’re addicted to drugs or they’re addicted to shoplifting.”
With the law having minimal effect, the best safeguards for merchants are extra surveillance cameras and security guards or – in the case of smaller merchants such as Springer- cheaper and more novel measures. He use mirrors on the ceiling, additional customer service and life-size cardboard cutouts that give customers the odd sensation they’re being watched.
“We have so many eyes in here,” Springer said.
Source:TDN.com
Nightclub security injured, several shot after man refused entry www.privateofficer.com
Columbus GA Nov 29 2010 Three people are recovering after an incident at a North Columbus nightclub. Police say two men were shot and a bouncer hit in the face with a gun early Sunday, at Club H2O.
Police say the suspect walked up to the front door of the club around 12:30 a.m. When the bouncer told he man he could not go in without an ID, police say the suspect got angry and attempted to push his way into the club anyway. But police say the bouncer pushed him back and told him to leave.
Police say the suspect left, but returned two hours later. Police say he walked up to the bouncer again, allegedly hit him in the face with a gun and then opened fire. Police say the suspect then ran into the parking lot.
A 29-year-old went to the hospital for a gunshot to the back. He is reportedly in stable condition. Another man told police he was grazed in the leg by a bullet, but declined medical treatment.
Police say they have no suspect. No arrests have been made.
Atlanta shopping center security involved in gunbattle www.privateofficer.com
By:Brett Davis/Staff
PRIVATE OFFICER NEWS
http://www.privateofficer.com/
Police say a woman was killed in a shootout between a security guard and her estranged husband at a discount mall in College Park.
Lt. Bruce Braxton said that 32-year-old Asa Stean Barrow was targeted by 36-year-old James Jamell Barrow. He says James Barrow and the security officer exchanged gunfire and that Asa Barrow was caught in the crossfire on Sunday at Old National Discount Mall.
Police say the woman was taken to an area hospital where she died.
Braxton said James Barrow escaped in a white sedan and police are searching for him.
Casino officers nab parolees using counterfeit credit cards www.privateofficer.com
Riverside CA Nov 29 2010 Two parolees, one a deported felon, are suspected of using counterfeit credit cards at four desert casinos and were in custody
today, the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department said.
Erik Baca, 27, of Los Angeles and Javier Lopez, 42, of San Juan Capistrano, a previously deported felon, were arrested Saturday and face burglary and credit card fraud charges.
The two men used counterfeit credit cards to obtain large cash advances from three casinos and attempted to do the same at a fourth, said Sgt. David Florez.
Nordstrom Visa notified security personnel at the Agua Caliente Casino in Rancho Mirage that a fraudulent transaction had occurred in the casino around 4:30 a.m. Saturday. Security officers contacted other area casinos to alert them of the situation.
At 10 a.m., security cameras at Fantasy Springs Resort captured the two suspects attempting to use the counterfeit cards to withdraw funds.
Sheriff’s deputies were alerted and Baca and Lopez were arrested before they could escape with the cash, Florez said.
They were booked into the Indio Jail and face charges of burglary and credit card fraud, according to jail records. Both men were held without bail.
Investigators searched Lopez’s home in San Juan Capistrano and found additional counterfeit cards and equipment for making the cards, Florez said.
Additional charges may be added, as the case was still under investigation.
Source:www.swrnn.com
