Woman passively outed for shoplifting and I did nothing?

'Kleptomania... (klep-toe-MAY-nee-uh) is a mental health disorder that involves repeatedly being unable to resist urges to steal items that you generally don't really need. Often the items stolen have little value and you could afford to buy them. Kleptomania is rare but can be a serious condition...'

Shoplifting is traditionally a sneaky type of theft favoured by those that don't have the stones for more rewarding, higher confrontation crime.

Logically the people who are the best shoplifters don't look like a shoplifter. People think of shoplifters as being homeless, visibly poor, benefits class people. Those people are rubbish shoplifters because everyone is all over them the moment they come in. Our most prolific lifters were all middle aged, sociable/amenable, better dressed women who buy stuff, and even though you know that they're still the ones that really go under the radar

It's a bit different now with steaming but we're not a co-op (brand), we don't stand by and let people steal so that type of crim prefers the type of shop where the staff are just going to leave them to it, which is most chains with non-invested staff

Shoplifting has an impact on the price of an item. For the shop to recover the profit on that item, we end up having to pay through increased prices!

Can you also sue them for reminding you to pay?

They probably see dozens of people every day shoplifting - that woman probably was! Not sure it means anything her being well dressed and looking upset!

Everyone is so outraged by woman allegedly stealing and a busy unpaid body, humuiliating her into paying but are pefectly alright with the price increase in everyting every time they shop. Misery truly loves company, and fighting each other is the perfect way to keep us all there.

A friend who works in a large shop says mums with prams are the biggest shoplifters. They slip things in the basket under. Just because I (and you) didn't do it, doesn't mean people who look just like us don't!

It feels really counterintuitive somehow

I'm genuinely surprised by this can you show us any examples of people suing shops because someone asked them not to steal something?

He actually shouldn't have and you can sue if a shop accuses you publicly before you've left the shop so it certainly was unprofessional. But worked out well for the woman if it was an accident that she dropped them in.

Gosh - judge, jury and executioner.

Like I said, we don’t know the facts so you can’t make a judgement on it.

A member of the New Zealand parliament has been arrested for three counts of high end shoplifting. Golritz Ghaharaman, an alleged Iranian refugee was elected because she was on a Green Party MMP list. No one actually voted for her inin the free world. what has to be the most undemocratic electoral system in the free world. She is the one sitting down. In front of her is a Mexican refugee who was elected in the same process.

Additionally I see more vigorous defence of this middle class looking woman (I accept we don’t know her race but I’m going to assume white or it would’ve been mentioned probably) who was caught red handed, than I did than on the thread for the black woman and her child who were wronglyaccused of not having a bus ticket and manhandled by the police.

Absolutely.

Don’t see harm in him saying ‘don’t forget to pay for the crisps’.. but the comments after we’re uncalled for.
I wouldn’t have said anything in your position, non of your business

I recommend some people on here never go to Australia where people asking to look in your bags before you leave a shop is pretty normal, even if you bought stuff.

We had a guy in our shop the other night, can't in walked round, had a nice chat with our staff, bought some cigarettes, large wad of cash, then he went and looked round the shop again, except he didn't just look he stole about 5 things with a nearly equivalent retail value to the cigarettes. People nicking broadly what they pay for is common. Some of our most prolific thieves were also surprisingly high spenders if you looked at them over weeks/months

Quite right!
Its not difficult to treat people with a bit of common decency.

Do u no if she has form is shoplifting from this store a regular occurance arde the staff paying shortfall from their wages do u no the background of this scenario or just a slightly overheard snippet

The second possibility is unlikely. She said the crisps were intended for her son, so she knew "what crisps" and she knew they were in her bag. She intended to leave without paying for them.

We all - including honest people who struggle to make ends meet - pay for shoplifters. She does not deserve sympathy or excuses. She's a thief and as others have said, the staff were probably already looking out for her.

Not for "no reason". We are paying for shoplifters too.

Where DB lives with his family in Hackney there’s a local Tescos. I’ve seen at least one person take a full basket of shopping there once or twice scan it all through, pack it up and then leg it! Very fast.

Our local Sainsbury’s about one has a receipt scanner to exit after using self service. The other one tried this but it didn’t work. The third one doesn’t have a receipt scanner.

Or maybe she's on the edge of a nervous breakdown, who knows

That's a tough one. They probably get a lot of people stealing things. I work in retail and shop lifting has gone up a lot in the last 6 months. They don't hide it very well either. I must admit most of the time it isn't the well dressed.
It might only have been a packet of crisps, but with our shop, it started our with a small item, they didn't get caught, so they come back for more.
It might have been a middle age woman, who forgot, with brain fog, or just been stressed. The employee wouldn't have known. It's sadly part of the job, we cannot tackle shop lifters, just ask them to pay or put it back.

The Police don't get involved with shoplifters with goods under the value of £200. The staff member was obviously on some kind of power trip tho'. She might have regularly stolen Bags of crisps ...

My take is that there are two possibilities.

One is that it was deliberate.

The other is that she had other things on her mind and put them in her bag without thinking.

However, none of us know the whole story so put it to bed and forget about it.

A woman was caught trying to steal a non essential item when buying her overpriced coffee. It is hardly Oliver Twist.

Even if she did drop it in her bag by mistake and it was a bit embarrassing, far worse things happen to people all the time. This is very low down on the scale.