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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Mar 2015
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    Houston, Texas, United States
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    Default Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Can you please help me? How serious to target take shop lifters? Is there anything they accept in order to just drop charges?

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Sep 2005
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    Behind a Desk
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    98,846

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Stores take shoplifting seriously because shoplifters cost them a lot of money. If you were charged, you should accept that you're not going to convince the store to change its mind about prosecuting you. You can consult a local criminal defense lawyer about whether you might qualify for a diversion program, if available, deferred sentence, or other disposition that might reduce the offense or allow you to avoid a conviction.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Mar 2015
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    Houston, Texas, United States
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    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    As I know they have contacted a lawyer. One thing the lawyer did find weird was that a police stopped him, not target personnel. To you know why that was ?

  4. #4

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Quote Quoting Alexis Miranda Flores
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    As I know they have contacted a lawyer. One thing the lawyer did find weird was that a police stopped him, not target personnel. To you know why that was ?
    Possibly police were in the store already and Target decided it would be easier to have them stop you. How many people got stopped?

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Jun 2006
    Location
    Massachusetts
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    24,521

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Give me one good reason why a shoplifter SHOULD have the charges dropped. What incentive does the store have to do so? Shoplifting is a crime - are you saying someone should be able to commit crimes with no repercussions? Why?

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Sep 2010
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    19,901

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Further, once you're charged, it's not necessarily in Target's hands. It's not Target that is harmed by your criminal activity, it is society and it is the state not Target that prosecutes you.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jul 2014
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    441

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Yes the store probably could get the charges dropped if they stated that they weren't interested in seeing the case pursued.

    No they won't do it.

    - - - Updated - - -

    To add - if you are hoping for diversion, I hope you made a good impression with the LP agents.

    I'm frequently asked by the prosecutor if I have any objection to someone entering a diversion program, and usually the prosecutor says "It's your call; I can go either way, and if you don't want them to get it, I'll oppose it."

    Depending on how nice (or not) the shoplifter was with me and depending on how much they made MY life difficult (not fessing up to other things I knew they had on them, not trying very hard to remember where they stashed ripped up packaging, thus making me spend a half hour looking for a needle in a haystack all over the store, etc.) I will either say "Yeah, I don't care, let them have diversion," or "No, I really don't think she/he should get diversion."

  8. #8

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Quote Quoting flyingron
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    Further, once you're charged, it's not necessarily in Target's hands. It's not Target that is harmed by your criminal activity, it is society and it is the state not Target that prosecutes you.
    In Texas, as in many states, the police cannot arrest on a misdemeanor they did not witness (except for a disorderly conduct charge). This means the complainant, Target, has to sign the charges alleging shoplifting. Without their participation, the case could not move forward.

    Having said this I can only remember only dropping the charges twice during my 40+ year career. In each case I went to the prosecutor and asked for charges to be dropped and explained why.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Jul 2014
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    441

    Default Re: Can You Get a Store to Drop Shoplifting Charges

    Quote Quoting Security Consultant
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    In Texas, as in many states, the police cannot arrest on a misdemeanor they did not witness (except for a disorderly conduct charge). This means the complainant, Target, has to sign the charges alleging shoplifting. Without their participation, the case could not move forward.

    Having said this I can only remember only dropping the charges twice during my 40+ year career. In each case I went to the prosecutor and asked for charges to be dropped and explained why.
    I was sort of thinking about this point after the fact. Most of my experience is with Ohio, but I know that here at least, there is a list of crimes in which the city or state are the "victim." Those don't require a victim's consent or affirmation to prosecute. Disorderly conduct is one, but there are several others that I can't recall off the top of my head, and if I recall correctly a couple of them are surprising (as in ones that you wouldn't think the city or state are the victim.) But open container in public, rioting, etc. are all offenses that you can be arrested for regardless of whether any person or other "victim" wants charges pressed.

    I did have an officer make a decision to arrest a shoplifting accomplice once independent of me; I told him that our policy didn't permit me to charge her, and he said he wanted to arrest her anyway because he had probable cause to do so. He arrested her and her charges were dropped by the prosecutor, but I'm not sure if it legally was because I did not sign a complaint or if it was because the case against her was weak (she definitely could have raised reasonable doubts IMO about her involvement in and knowledge of the theft, even though everyone involved KNEW she knew what was going on.)

    Domestic violence is the only type of case I know of where prosecutors routinely prosecute without the victim's consent and even against the victim's wishes. This is specifically written into law to be allowed and it is because of the common occurrence of victims being fearful of their aggressors and/or realizing that they actually need their abusers to be able to make money to survive. Hence, some victims have ended up being killed after continually going back to their abusers, triggering the laws that allow and encourage prosecutors to seek convictions even against the victim's wishes.

    So, yes, in this case, I'm betting that the case DOES hinge in part or totally upon Target's participation.

    And like Security Consultant, I've seen precious few times where charges are later dropped; One time that I'm aware of had to do with an Alzheimer's diagnosis and if the store hadn't asked for the charges to be dropped they probably would have been anyway, or the subject certainly would have been found not guilty.

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