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Storytime!: Tell your shoplifting stories here

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  • #31
    At the museum where I volunteer, a docent overhead a couple of 10-year old schoolboys bragging about the stuff they'd stolen from the gift shop of the museum they'd visited earlier in the day. The docent told their teacher, who just shrugged and said "boys will be boys."

    We called the other museum. They thanked and said they would be telephoning the school as soon as they did a quick inventory check. Wish I knew the final outcome.

    Not quite shoplifting, but I once caught a kid breaking of a piece of an exhibit and putting it in his pocket. Fortunately the exhibit was an easily-repaired replica. That teacher did not shrug it off.

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    • #32
      Quoth nutraxfornerves View Post
      The docent told their teacher, who just shrugged and said "boys will be boys."
      And said school was never invited back again?

      Quoth nutraxfornerves View Post
      That teacher did not shrug it off.
      Glad to hear that!

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      • #33
        We had an ex employee that had been caught with his hand in the till so to speak. So he was promptly fired. Big suprise there. But then he gets the brilliant idea to shoplift. Our bakery dept is literally right beside the door so he just dashed in (smile, you're on camera) grabbed a couple cheap cakes, and ran out. At the same store he had just been fired from the week before. The one that still had all his personal information like his adress for instance. Not hard for the cops to track someone down when you can give them the name, description, and address of the person.

        A more funny one. There's a couple of raccoons by the store because a nearby old lady feeds them. One day, three of the little trash pandas decide to stage a robbery. Our other set of automatic doors (not the ones by bakery) open into floral and then into produce. Of course, these are professional thieves. So they sneak in and we don't really take note of the door opening and closing without customers as it has been broken for months and will sometimes just do that. Or refuse to work period. And the sneaky little bandits (two of them) start headed towards the produce section where they sit under the displays and munch on food. Then a third one joins the party... And a forth and a fifth until they've quite packed themselves in there. At night the stock people usually have headphones in because it's just that busy. So they don't notice what little noise there is and the rest of us have no reason to visit other depts. but eventually he notices the fact that despite how much he has stocked it seems the pile is staying about the same. It was even getting lower. So he calls us front end ppl over because, hey boredom, and we hide out of sight of the afflicted produce stand scooby do style. (Yes we were in fact that bored.) and we watch as a raccoon squeezed out from under the stand( it's hollow inside but it does have sides that don't quite reach the floor because wheels) and grabs food, shoves it under and then follows after. Now by this time we are staring in a cross of morbid fascination and horror. We decide the best way to deal with the problem is to wheel the display over to the loading doors and sort of hang it half over the ledge so there's a big hole and more importantly a bit of a drop for the trash pandas to exit. It our sleep deprived young adult incredibly bored minds, this seems like a good idea. So we do it, and we can hear squeaking and hissing, growling and other animal sounds (we keep all feet and limbs well away from the bottom in case something pops out to eat us. we get to the loading doors and hover it about a foot over the edge. Nothing comes out. Kind of like a horror film you can hear the annoyed trash pandas but you can't see any of them. So we grab the vacuum because it's loud. And turn it on and off again at the opposite end. The side we are on and would prefer they don't come out of.

        We watch in slight fascination/horror as one two three four five raccoons go running out.

        Then we go back and clean up the (large) mess from where the display was hiding the floor before sharing a 'did that just happen?' Moment... Then we continued our boring shift. I don't know yet the response by the managers for that as I won't be working for several days. (Vacation Time )
        Don’t worry about what I’m up to. Worry about why you are worried about what I’m up to.

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        • #34
          I work at Joanns too as a stocker/cashier. The new GM is an idiot and won't lock anything up. A week after he told us not to lock anything, someone took a sewing machine out the back door that has an alarm on it. Of course it was the most expensive one, like $500 or more, and of course he blamed the new manager when it was her first night and no one could have really stopped it. He still won't lock anything up. I hate him.

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          • #35
            I hate him too.

            BTW, welcome. It looks like you are a new member. Please continue your stories, we like to band up here to complain about our common enemy. (Usually known as common sense and common curtesy.)

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            • #36
              Quoth ImPoliteNotNice View Post
              I work at Joanns too as a stocker/cashier.
              Welcome fellow fabric slave! There are a few of us here, though I had to quit or lose what's left of my mind. Our store went through various "lock up everything!" and "don't lock up anything!" phases. We had several sewing machines go out the front door. They also installed these sensors that paged notices when people were in certain aisles. "Assistance needed in fine art. Assistance needed in jewelry." Yes, that's going to deter shoplifting.

              ...I'll stop now because I feel a long rant coming on. Anyways, I worked the cutting counter for a long time, then added office/opening duties, then cashiering. The addition of cashiering combined with a new SM were the last straws.
              Replace anger management with stupidity management.

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              • #37
                I spent twenty years in public safety (law enforcement and emergency medical services) and spent many a shift chasing down shoplifters and carting them off to their karmic reward.
                The one that stands out in my mind happened on a shift where things were slow, and my Lieutenant and I were sitting in a parking lot chewing the fat (I was a Sergeant at the time) when a pickup truck pulls into the lot (empty lot, besides our two squads), and makes us both a bit nervous. A gentleman gets out and stands about twenty feet from us, his hands both clearly visible and asks if he can speak to one of us regarding a crime that has been committed. We pull our squads up so we're flanking him and approach him.
                I ask him what's up, and he turns around and walks the ten or so feet to the back door on his truck, opens it, and in Spanish (very angry Spanish, I might add), says, "GET OUT HERE RIGHT NOW!"
                Three young lads get out, shaking like leaves in the tree. I don't blame them. I'm six four and was about 225 at the time and my Lt. was six two and about 240. We are both large men and quite intimidating to young men who have been out breaking the law. Dad says, "Tell the police what you did!"
                THe oldest boy, who I find out is 13, begins to bawl. Honest, real tears. "Please, Papa, no, no. We'll be good."
                His younger brother, who is 10, and his youngest brother, who is 8, immediately spit out the truth: They had gone with their Dad to the store and gotten caught stealing candy. Three candy bars, maybe 4 dollars in merchandise. Dad caught them on the way to the truck and marched them right back into the store. The clerk declined to call the police since the merchandise was returned but Dad wanted to make sure it didn't happen again.

                "Take them to jail. I didn't raise criminals. They want to steal, cuff them, take them away!"
                My LT takes out his cuffs and cuffs the eldest (we couldn't cuff the youngest two per dept policy) and I take the two younger ones and march them in front of me to the police car, well aware of what Dad was doing.

                In the American South, where I worked, this is known as a "Come to Jesus" moment. My father had quelled my own teenage rebellion with a similar occurrence, and the goal is to get the kids to realize that jail is NOT a place you want to go.

                I put the two in my car, LT put the one in his, and then we sat and talked to Dad about things. He wanted them to understand that breaking the law is still breaking the law even if you return the things you stole, and you can still be arrested even if you do return them (in some cases, petty $4 thefts not being one of those cases...) and so after watching all three weep and beg for a second chance, my LT goes and lets all of them out of the car and proceeds to dress them down in true USMC fashion (He was a Marine; and a former DI. He never cussed once but it was a definite eye opener). He explained how police risk their lives chasing shoplifters, and how many people think it's just a joke to steal things, but it isn't. After a minute or two he lowered his voice and asked them about their plans for their lives and how they thought going to jail might change those plans. He explained that people who have criminal records aren't able to get into Medical School (The oldest) or become firemen (the youngest) or go into the Military in most cases (the middle son).
                He shook their hands, told them he never wanted to see any of them ever again, and walked them back to their Dad, their faces wet and all three sobbing out apologies to their father for what they did, promising to never do it again.

                Had to give mad props to that Dad for seeing us there and taking the opportunity to let his sons know that stealing (or any law-breaking) wasn't going to be tolerated.

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                • #38
                  It's a darn shame more parents don't do things like this, sometimes it takes an event along these lines to get through to some kids...

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                  • #39
                    Dude sounds like my dad. Good for him.

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                    • #40
                      Kid with a bad future

                      I used to work for a large potato chip company, route sales, and one day I was in a small variety store. I heard some commotion and the manager had caught a kid with some bubble gum packs in his school bag. He denied he took them and said he bought them at another location down the street. I mentioned that I had been there earlier and the store has none of these type of packs. The kid panicked and changed his story saying he was sorry. The manager asked for his home number and called his father who showed up promptly. The father looked at him and I swear this is what he said. " Well I guess you are not getting that new bike this weekend, I am going to make you wait another week " . The store manager and I just stared at each other in shock. This kid learned there was no real consequence from stealing.

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                      • #41
                        I was about 8 or 9 and thought I was slick and stole some random stuff from a sporting goods store in the mall. I almost got away with it till dear old dad saw my shirt bulging. He kicked my ass all the way back into the mall, made me face the cashier and apologize. Then he kicked my ass right back out to the car. And I mean he literally kicked me in my ass.

                        This was also the late 80's early 90's, when you could use corporal punishment on your children and nobody paid any attention.

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                        • #42
                          Quoth FreddyB View Post
                          I used to work for a large potato chip company, route sales, and one day I was in a small variety store. I heard some commotion and the manager had caught a kid with some bubble gum packs in his school bag. He denied he took them and said he bought them at another location down the street. I mentioned that I had been there earlier and the store has none of these type of packs. The kid panicked and changed his story saying he was sorry. The manager asked for his home number and called his father who showed up promptly. The father looked at him and I swear this is what he said. " Well I guess you are not getting that new bike this weekend, I am going to make you wait another week " . The store manager and I just stared at each other in shock. This kid learned there was no real consequence from stealing.
                          That's a beautiful story. I love happy endings.

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                          • #43
                            Quoth eltf177 View Post
                            It's a darn shame more parents don't do things like this, sometimes it takes an event along these lines to get through to some kids...
                            Yup. A couple of my cousins were caught stealing Christmas lights off of houses a few years ago, and the cops threw them in jail. When their dad found out he let them stay in jail overnight rather than bailing them out right then and there (and this was actually around Christmas at the time so they spent Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in jail) to think about what they did.
                            He bailed them out on Boxing Day and then grounded them well into the new year. Between the grounding and having to spend Christmas in jail they learned their lesson and never stole anything again.
                            my favourite author is neil gaiman. - me
                            it is? I don't like potatoes much. - the chatbot I was talking to

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                            • #44
                              When I was about 8 I tried to steal an Andes mint. My dad tapped me on the head and said, "We don't take things without paying for them." The weird part about this was that my dad seemingly materialized out of the floor, as he hadn't been there when I took the mint. I put it back, and never tried to steal again after that because I never knew if one of my parents would suddenly show up. I knew I'd have gotten in big trouble if I'd been caught stealing - happened to my sister, and she was made to apologize to the store manager and she got a spanking and was grounded. She was 6. To my knowledge she never did it again.

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                              • #45
                                I have a lot of stories.

                                One story was when I worked in the library. We receive "documents for public viewing," which were stuff either published by the government about upcoming projects (like a new treatment plant being planned or the city needs to use bonds for some project) or a company is going to do something that involves tax-payers dollars or affects the environment. Now there are only one copy of these documents, so they can't leave the building, since everyone who wants to look at them can.

                                So a guy comes in and wants a to see a document about our bus service. I show him where it is. He gets it and he heads for the door. I run after him and stop him outside the library and tell him he can't take it. At least he apologized and went back in with it. But these documents are always getting stolen or "lost".

                                I think I told this story, though I can't find it. Guy comes in to the bookstore, and he is in line wanting to return some stuff. A batman bust and some other model, and a blue ray of The Force Awakens. about $200 worth of stuff. He has no receipt. He's returning it because his son was bad so he's not getting a Christmas. Without receipt, he can't return it, and since he says he paid cash, we can't find the transaction. So since we can't give him cash (I forgot if the manager offered him store credit), he decides to leave with the items but the alarm goes off. The manager tells him to come back, he will check on stuff. Manger tries to find in the system if we sold these items anytime recently. Manger goes away (to the video monitor in back)Guy waits a while, says he has to go to work, then leaves. The manager looks at the video of the guy entering the store, without items, get the items off the displays, and get in line for a refund, and the manager would have to let the guy go when he first tried to leave since he couldn't just accuse the guy of ripping us off until the alarm went off.

                                One time a mom came back in after checking out with an item her daughter had. The daughter was 3 or 4 and when she was at teh register the daughter tried to get the mom to put the item on the counter. But the mom wasn't paying attention, though the mom intended to buy the item for the daughter. the girl was so short I couldn't see that she had the item in hand. At least the mom came back to buy it after they left.
                                Last edited by depechemodefan; 03-13-2017, 04:07 AM. Reason: spelling
                                Time! Time! Time is what turns kittens into cats.

                                Don't teach me a lesson; all I learn is that you are an asshole.

                                I wish porn had subtitles.

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