AIBU to ask if shoplifting has effectively been decriminalised?

[IsawwhatIsaw]

I know there have been previous threads about shoplifting.
here’s another one, as I just heard our small local supermarket lost around 50 bottles of wine in a few minutes the other night.
apparently 3 men came in with big bags and set about clearing the wine shelves. Then casually walked out.
This shop has continuous shoplifting but not usually on this scale. Think more sweets, sandwiches, meat.
And there are very few staff in there now because of self service tills . Maybe the supermarket feels slashing staff numbers still works out cheaper the man stopping any theft deterrent .
so my Aibu is to ask whether shoplifting has been effectively decriminalized.

Get rid of all the luxuries in prison. No free playstations etc. Just bare concrete cells. And make the prisoners work for their keep. There's no need for prisons to be so expensive to run.

Not automatically...
If you think there are two types of people who shoplift:

1. Junkies/career criminals - either as individuals or as part of criminal gangs
2. People you wouldn't expect. E.g. the parents posting on Facebook someone else mentioned earlier. Either they are doing it out of need or, often, for the thrill. I would also put teenagers in this category

The first category don't care about going to prison. They are often junkies, their lives aren't great and they aren't really planning ahead. Prison could in theory help people like that but it's as rehabilitation not deterrence and short sentences don't do that. Especially not done as punishment.
The second category are often functioning from a misunderstanding of risk. I posted about it upthread but basically if you get away with something once (say there is a 20%chance of it going wrong) you downgrade the risk in your head. So the next time you assume a 10% risk, then a 5% risk. This is not how risk/probability works but it's how humans perceived it. So those people will keep going until they get caught and it all goes wrong for them. Higher sentences won't work because the longer you shoplift the less you think it will happen to you.

I'm not against prison sentences for shoplifting/theft in general. But "increase the deterrence" isn't really a proven way to discourage people. Catching people earlier in their shoplifting career is likely more effective. For junkies, addiction treatment, for teenagers third spaces, youth clubs etc reduces the people in the offending category.

I've just written a pre-sentence report for a prolific shoplifter, recommending custody.

So no. It has not been decriminalised

How much stuff does a person have to steal in order to become a prolific shoplifter worthy of a custodial sentence though? I had a Google and most of the shoplifters who were sent to prison seemed to have stolen in excess of £10k. Not in one go but over multiple visits and they convict with cctv. It’s such a lot of money for shops to lose.

Well, this person is unlikely to have accrued that much, but they are a repeat offender with a heroin habit who was given a suspended sentence last time which they immediately broke.
Im confident they aren't going to engage with anything probation can offer in the community and they've refused the option of a residential rehab as an alternative to prison so...

In Lidl‘s in Europe, you have to scan your receipt in order to open the gate to let you out of the store. Maybe we should adopt that practice although I know it would be very expensive to install them everywhere.

They do that at Sainsburys. It should be universal in all supermarkets.

Shoplifters are quite literally the scum of the earth and they need to be stopped.

They have that in my Lidl in England. So maybe it will eventually be rolled out here

You have to scan a receipt but if you’ve only paid for 5/10 things in your bag it won’t recognise that! Someone could walk in, steal a bags worth, pay for one banana and get out?!

Of course we care. But we care more about our own lives. These people are either part of organised crime, or junkies. Nobody wants to get hurt. The employers also don’t want a news story out there where an employee gets shoved and smacks their head on the floor, or gets stabbed - some PR that is.

It’s not decriminalised, it’s just too hard to police. Over 10 years in retail and there is nothing you can do. By the time you got your phone out of your pocket to dial 999 they’re gone.