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Why Do People Steal… And Does It Matter?

Why do people steal? Today’s organized retail crime (ORC) investigators recognize that drug addiction may be a motivation of of professional thieves. This has been the case for quite some time. But now experts are now asking: does it matter if the opioid crisis is the driving force behind their behavior? What implications might that trend have on retail loss prevention and security strategies?

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Contributing Writer Garett Seivold examines this idea more closely in a feature article for the August 2018 issue of LPM Online. Retailers are apparently being blamed for turning a blind eye to the return fraud profiteering that is being used to fund the opioid crisis. From the article:

The criticism is unfair, said [consultant] Walter Palmer—who moderated the “Shoplifters, ORC, Shrinking Justice & Opioids: What’s a Retailer to Do?” session at the Retail Industry Leader Association’s 2018 Retail Asset Protection Conference—firstly because retailers are not the cause but the primary victims of addicts’ theft and additionally because retailers have made some significant shifts in return policies. Several major retailers have significantly tightened return policies to help eliminate the secondary market for cards, he noted, and have even gone so far as to associate nonreceipted returns with customer drivers’ licenses.

- Digital Partner -

In “Inside the ORC-Opioid Connection,” Seivold attempts to decipher whether the answer to the question “Why do people steal?” has any real implications on how retailers address ORC. If we as an industry want to help fight the opioid crisis, what are the next steps? Find out in the article.

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