About those smash and grabs...

[Baitball Blogger]

how is it possible that a black man can't sell cigarettes on the street without getting killed, but a smash and grab, which had to take five to ten minutes, managed to be successful without one police on the scene?

[doc03]

1. Why would police do their job if shop lifting

Isn't prosicuted? It's legal.

[jimfields33]

2. Good point.

[Mariana]

61. It might be a good point, IF

A: shoplifting was legal (it isn't) and B: this was a shoplifting incident (it wasn't).

[Baitball Blogger]

5. That was more than shoplifting. That was vandalism.

[Floyd R. Turbo]

9. Vandalism, assault and battery, armed robbery, etc., etc.

[Baitball Blogger]

11. I know. Why is everyone else seeing this as a simple shoplifting?

[Floyd R. Turbo]

14. Myopia.

[Mariana]

60. It fits with the right-wing narrative.

First, spread the lie that shoplifting is legal, when it isn't. Then pretend that every incidence of theft from a store is shoplifting, and is therefore legal (based on the first lie). It works on some DUers, apparently.

[doc03]

24. What happen to them if they get caught? I'm thinking

out on the street the next night.

[Mr.Bill]

16. No it is not. People get arrested for it every day.

And what these mobs are doing is a felony, and some have been charged. It's a pre-meditated robbery and is being charged as such.

[Mariana]

59. This isn't shoplifting.

Also, please provide a source for your claim that shoplifting is legal. TIA.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

3. Do you want smash-and-grabbers strangled at the scene too?

[Baitball Blogger]

6. What?

That's what you got out that?

[WhiskeyGrinder]

8. Any time you want cops on the scene, that's what you risk.

[Baitball Blogger]

10. This was an active and excessive destruction of property.

Presumably, this one falls under the police's mission statement.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

12. Yes, protecting property is one of their main purposes.

[Dial H For Hero]

42. And protecting property is...bad?

[WhiskeyGrinder]

43. When you enforce it by killing people, yeah, the model kind of sucks.

[Calculating]

50. So lock em up

All of these smash and grab criminals need some time in prison.

[Dial H For Hero]

57. That doesn't sound like a very accurate model. Let's talk numbers.

Out of the millions of property crimes which are investigated by the police every year, how many result in the police killing the perpetrator?

[Calculating]

49. Seriously?

These assholes are like roaming gangs if bandits who need to be stopped. If we don't stop this kind of behavior it will lead to the downfall of civil society.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

56. .

it will lead to the downfall of civil society.

Honestly can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not.

[dutch777]

4. I don't think the police are engaging in events like this until they have adequate force

And you can't really blame them. Retail theft is considered more a property insurance loss issue than a serious crime. Problem is more of this that is tolerated the more it will happen. Amazingly good organization on the looters part you have to admit.

[Baitball Blogger]

7. This was destruction of property. This was not a regular shoplifting.

[Amishman]

48. The point is still valid, a couple officers isn't going to engage a large violent group

Not to mention the matter of response times.

[Sympthsical]

13. The point of the smash and grab is to not stick around

Police aren't just loitering around stores waiting for crime to happen.

There was an incident last year in my local shopping center. I had gotten some Subway and decided to eat outside while reading a book as it was a nice day and I had time to mosey. Suddenly a man with two bags goes flying by the seating area where I was eating. Fifteen seconds later, two employees from the Good Will store go past. After a few minutes, they come walking back past me, so I ask. Apparently the guy had gone in to grab a bunch of electronics and threatened the employees with a knife.

Cops showed up maybe 10-15 minutes after the shoplifter ran past me. I have no idea if they ever caught him.

People standing around and people actively fleeing aren't really comparable things.

[Baitball Blogger]

15. The next time it happens, one of those fine people who carry should shot the tires of

their getaway cars.

[Voltaire2]

18. What?

You and Kyle both think random citizens ought to be defending other people’s property with their guns. Wtf.

[Baitball Blogger]

21. There is a big difference between shooting people and shooting the tires of a

car. Not sure why I have to discern that difference for you.

Bystander apathy is also a problem in this country.

[Sympthsical]

33. People in real life do not have that kind of aim

Bullets bounce off pavement. In a shopping center, people are standing around in many directions. Is recovering laundry detergent worth offing a child standing outside a CVS with their parent?

It's reckless endangerment.

[Baitball Blogger]

34. So, you visualize a car that is speeding away, when

I am referring to a car that is parked and stationary. Big difference.

[Sympthsical]

35. Bullets bounce in any scenario

Through the tire off the pavement. It doesn't take much.

I don't own guns, I never want to. But I do know, you do not pull that trigger unless you are very comfortable with the thought that a life will be potentially ended by it.

[Baitball Blogger]

38. Frankly, I would rather the gun carry people to take aim at inanimate objects, than people.

Sometimes it comes down to the lesser of two evils.

[Sympthsical]

39. The lesser evil in this case would be not aiming at all

We're talking about shopping centers with innocent people around outside the stores and in the parking lot.

If there's not an imminent threat to life and limb, I'd rather guns be left out of it entirely.

[rgbecker]

66. You don't need guns to disable a car.

https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-protests-for-racial-justice/2020/06/09/873110812/police-officers-slashed-car-tires-during-minneapolis-protests-police-agencies-sa

[Sympthsical]

19. I doubt Good Will employees in California are packing

Also, real life is not Hollywood. Do not fire a weapon unless you're willing to take a life. It's a shopping center full of cars and people. It would be grossly irresponsible.

That said, wouldn't have mattered in my case. The thief was on foot as were the two employees who went after him. He disappeared into the woods by a library. I walk through them often enough. If you have a plan and know the area, you can disappear pretty quickly, which I imagine was very much his intent.

[Baitball Blogger]

23. In your case, I don't see any other option either.

But, there were at least six cars waiting to leave the scene of a crime.

[Sympthsical]

29. Given the level of organization, I'd imagine look outs are involved

Maybe know the patterns of police patrol, have a few people listening to scanners, know the roads and amount of cops around at any given time.

Just by virtue of living here, I have a pretty firm grasp of the police presence in my area. Almost none around early in the morning. One or two might float around the shopping center by afternoon - the peak shopping periods. Even then, you often don't see them. The only kind of presence in the entire shopping center is usually the private security guy standing around outside the Costco.

Plus, my city's geographic area is spread out quite a bit. If I was going to smash and grab, I'd do it where I live. The cops are six, seven miles away towards the city center where there are crime problems.

I've mentioned before, there's a guy at my local Safeway. He's a regular shoplifter. He'll put two cases of beer in a shopping cart and walk right on out the door. Employees are instructed not to interfere. Like, they know who the guy is as soon as he walks through the door. But the cops are never around when he appears, so he just goes on doing it.

If people aren't getting prosecuted, the cops aren't going to come bouncing over from wherever to bother about it.

[Baitball Blogger]

31. I understand your point about locals learning the police patterns.

But, again, this was not a simple shoplifting. I'm sure the manager of the local Safeway would have something to say if the guy pushed over displays or broke glass barriers each time he came in to shoplift.

[Omnipresent]

17. Timing.

The smash and grab guys get in an get out fast.
The guy selling cigarettes on the street, would probably linger in one spot, long enough for the police to take notice.

[Hortensis]

37. The premise is a black man can't sell cigarettes without being executed.

Presumably why we don't normally see black men selling cigarettes on the street? All who try are quickly executed by the police (made easy by that standing in one place too long thing). Apparently no one was left alive to clue poor Eric Garner in.

Don't feed the premises, it just encourages them to come back for more.

[Omnipresent]

64. The angle of your argument doesn't apply to my response.

I didn’t address race, just police response timing to two separate situations.

Do we know the race of the smash and grab crowd?

Did the police allow the smash and grab crowd to flee, because they were white?

Your ability to posture in the spirit of TFG, does little to inform me, but reminds me of how pompous some people can get on DU.

[JI7]

20. These are planned crimes. If they see or think cops are there they wont do it .

They also seem to happen very quickly .

And i'm guessing even if there are cops or security people around there aren't that many to stop the number of people doing it .

[MineralMan]

22. So many stores - So few cops.

The problem is that it is impossible to predict where and when those smash and grab thieves will strike.

[Baitball Blogger]

25. I can see that.

I wonder what the response time for the police was in this case?

[MineralMan]

26. I don't know, but response time is never

less than a few minutes. In that time, the thieves have struck and gone. Plus, an effective response would require multiple officers, which always takes longer.

The logistics of that cannot work. So, those robberies will probably continue, until those who plan and lead them are arrested and jailed.

[Baitball Blogger]

27. I think I read somewhere that they nabbed seven or eight people,

so this is a crime that has an expiration date on freedom.

Hopefully.

[Mr.Bill]

46. The strategy they are using in some areas of San Francisco

is to shut down automobile traffic in some of the shopping areas. That may mean shoppers have to park a few blocks away, but shopping in an area like Union Square is sort of like that anyway. But it means they can't have ten running get-away vehicles right outside the doors of the store. This kind of messes up their whole method.

[MineralMan]

47. That might work, but will also create difficulties for shoppers.

This phenomenon is probably going to be difficult to stop, I think.

[Mr.Bill]

51. Well, flash mobs spraying pepper spray

sort of creates difficulties for shoppers, too.

[MineralMan]

53. Yes, but the odds of that happening are very, very low.

So, I think most consumers aren't much worried about it. Besides, if it happens, the robbers don't seem to be attacking shoppers, so just step out of their way and move to some other part of the store you're in. Still, it's extremely unlikely that such a thing will occur in any given place at the time you are there.

[Mr.Bill]

54. Well, a few people have been assaulted

but because of the amount of time they spend there, it's the employees that are more exposed to danger. What has gone out the window is the feeling you are safer in the daytime.

[MineralMan]

55. Yes. Employees are the most likely to encounter this, for sure.

It's a real problem for the businesses, to be sure, and I can't see how it can be guarded against effectively.

I have no idea how many incidents of it have actually occurred, though. I suspect it's pretty isolated. If the people who plan those robberies can be identified and prosecuted, I'm guessing the phenomenon will die out. These are not unplanned things.

[PTWB]

28. Are you seriously asking how this is possible?

Are you under the impression that every time a black man sells cigarettes on the street he is killed by police? Or that they even show up? Or that anyone even reports it?

I get being enraged by the murder of Eric Garner. And I get being enraged by the brazen robberies at luxury retailers.

But conflating the two subjects seems desperate and intentionally misleading. Quite frankly, it comes off as offensive and disingenuous.

It seems like you're trying to capitalize on Eric Garner's murder for cheap points. I don't know you so I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that's not what you intended. Consider editing or rephrasing / rehashing whatever point you were trying to make.

[Baitball Blogger]

30. Here's the irony of your statement.

I could have used any number of cases where police interjected themselves in a lethal way. I just picked the first one that came to mind.

But, look how you reacted, which is the entire point. It enrages the mind to think that their judgment is excessive when it comes to minor or no violations committed by black men. But, where are they when the real crimes are being committed?

[PTWB]

32. When seconds matter, the police are minutes away (as some are fond of saying).

There are thousands of police interactions with the general public, and with criminals, every single day. Sometimes crimes are detected through routine patrol and sometimes they are not. Sometimes crimes are reported by witnesses and sometimes they're not. Sometimes crimes are discovered immediately and sometimes they are not discovered for many years, or not at all. It seems strange you ask where the police are when "real crimes are being committed."

Do we really want a heavy, constant police presence at luxury retail outlets to deter robberies? I don't.

I'd rather have them engaged in community policing activities, responding to domestic violence complaints, and enforcing traffic laws.

[Baitball Blogger]

36. Not that I like the slogan, "Defund the Police,"

but the whole premise of that effort was to fund social workers to give them the responsibility of handling cases that, all too often, the police over-reacted to with lethal force. Because the police lack the training to understand everything from mental illness to diabetic shock.

And, yes, in turn, I would expect them to respond to the kind of situation that involves a smash and grab.

[PTWB]

40. So now you think that they didn't respond at all?

[Baitball Blogger]

41. They did. They just arrived late. I presume.

[Voltaire2]

67. The police rarely stop an actual crime in progress.

They show up after the crime has occurred.

On the other hand they do intercede in a lot of non-crimes. Traffic bullshit stops, unlicensed street vendors, consensual sex and drug retail transactions, the usual nonsense.

[taxi]

44. The answer depends on who is reading it, and what that person identifies more with.

There are many who see a black man on the sidewalk as something scary. These are the people who cannot understand that no one wants to hang out on the damn sidewalk selling cigarettes. It's a place their minds don't go. With the smash and grab though, it can be just another job for the police to look into, nothing worth being upset or killed over.

[Patton French]

45. Smash and grab is OC.

They’re in and out and scattering in minutes, before there’s time for a police response. Any bystander who tries to interfere risks serious injury or death.

[greenjar_01]

52. I have a secret for you

Plenty of people sell loosies all day long all across the country without ever seeing a police officer.

Pass it on.

[Voltaire2]

58. Once again. We are in a manufactured panic

over shoplifting at mega-corp box stores.
Step back and realize you are being manipulated by your billionaire overlords.

[Mariana]

62. No, no!! This kind of thing has NEVER EVER happened before!!

Organized groups of people committing crimes is completely new and different!!

[AwakeAtLast]

63. In high prices stores where the security is shit

Nothin' to see here....

[ck4829]

65. Good question