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2012 Archives
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ORC group of 3 women hitting Target stores in San Antonio
filling duffle bags and using the emergency exits.
A San Antonio woman may be linked to nearly a dozen
shoplifting cases at Target stores. Rebecca Dynes, 23, has
been charged in just one incident, a Feb. 1 shoplifting at
the Target in the 700 block of Northwest Loop 410, the
station says. But an arrest affidavit said police are
investigating 10 similar cases. The affidavit said that in
each case, three women entered the stores together, took a
duffel bag from the store shelves and filled it with DVD box
sets. One of the women then left the store while the other
two loitered near an emergency exit, the station says. The
most recent case was caught on a surveillance video, KSAT
reports. The video shows a vehicle pulling up and two women
exiting through the emergency door and running to the
waiting vehicle. (Source
mysanantonio.com)
Excerpts from
GAO-11-675: Efforts to Combat Organized Retail
Crime
The U.S. Government Accountability Office ORC report
June 2011
Law Enforcement Agencies Collaborate with Retailers
to Investigate ORC, and Federal Agencies Are Taking
Steps to Improve ORC Case Tracking
Federal Efforts- continued from
yesterday;
FBI: The FBI largely identifies and conducts
ORC-related investigations through seven major theft
task forces operated in conjunction with other
federal, state, and local law enforcement officers.
Within the FBI, a total of approximately 55 agents
are involved in investigating major theft violations
nationwide, some of which are assigned full-time to
the 7 major theft task forces located in Chicago,
Memphis, New York, El Paso (2), and Miami (2).
Agents within these task forces are responsible for
working all categories of major theft, which include
cargo, vehicle, art, gem and jewelry, and organized
retail theft. According to the major theft program
coordinator at headquarters, FBI field units in
other regions may also initiate an ORC investigation
if retailers or local law enforcement present a case
to these units or if another federal agency refers a
case to them. This official noted that retailers are
generally best suited to identify patterns of stolen
merchandise, begin theft investigations, and
potentially build ORC cases to the point that they
may warrant involvement by federal agencies. He
stated that the FBI generally determines to initiate
a retail crime investigation on a case-by-case basis
and the decision may be affected by competing
threats and other resource priorities. While he is
not aware of the FBI turning down any ORC cases that
retailers presented he further stated that cargo
theft and vehicle theft likely represent the
greatest proportion of cases and the biggest
financial impact within the unit.
According to FBI officials, the primary nexus for
bureau involvement with ORC cases relates to the
criminal statute prohibiting the interstate
transportation of stolen property, a statute that
generally applies to stolen goods having a value of
$5,000 or more. The FBI major theft coordinator
noted, however, that the FBI could potentially
initiate an ORC case through an investigation of a
related criminal activity, including this case, a
different FBI component may have the lead for the
investigation, such as the "white-collar crime"
unit. According to the FBI as of February 2011, the
FBI had 531 open cases of interstate transportation
of stolen property across the different theft
categories. However, officials were unable to
identify how many of those cases involve ORC
because, until recently, they did not track cases by
individual theft categories. As a result, it is
unclear to what extent the FBI is using resources to
investigate ORC or how the numbers of these cases
compare to other major theft categories. Such
information would generally be useful to help
identify the potential scope of ORC and would
provide management with enhanced data with which to
make potential resource allocation decisions. FBI
continued tomorrow.
(Source
gao.gov)
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