Who are the shoplifters?
Shoplifters come in two basic categories — the “professionals” who steal for resale or profit as a business, and regular people who steal to get something for nothing, often as a result of social or personal pressures in their lives, according to the National Association for Shoplifting Prevention, a non-profit organization based in Jericho, N.Y. It reports there are about 27 million shoplifters (1 in 11 people) in the United States. About 25 percent are kids and 75 percent are adults. About 3 percent are professionals who are responsible for 10 percent of the dollar loss, the association says at www.shopliftingprevention.org. The professionals include drug addicts who steal to feed their habit, and others who steal regularly as their “business,” the association reports. Rodriguez, for example, has a 1996 felony drug conviction in Los Angeles County, two drug-related convictions in Kern County in the 1990s, and a pending drug case in Kern County Superior Court, according to court reco
