BUFFALO, N.Y. — Gov. Kathy Hochul says the state of New York is now throwing more resources into the battle against the growing problem of retail theft.
More funding may help local law enforcement here and across the state go after organized rings of shoplifters.
Erie County District Attorney John Flynn said "it's very organized in the sense that it's planned, executed, and it involves multiple people."
Flynn said it is an escalating retail theft problem with gangs, and even serial shoplifters, hitting stores around the state and the country with an estimated retail business loss of $112 billion in 2022.
Flynn says no actual local violent smash and grabs have occurred here, but still, there are people clearing off store shelves and just running out.
And there is this particular element with the ringleaders according to Flynn.
"A lot of times the people who they send into the stores have drug problems, and they give them drugs to feed their habit in exchange for working for them by stealing the stuff," he said.
Flynn said instead of just no bail required larceny charges, prosecutors can use trespassing charges against people, like a Buffalo man sentenced Wednesday to from three and half to seven years in prison. Flynn says the man violated a court order after he was originally charged with the larceny count of shoplifting.
"If he goes back to that store now, he is violating that trespass order, which makes it a burglary now, and I can get him on a higher felony charge of burglary," Flynn said.
This is tied to the $45 million state effort to provide more specialized retail theft investigators and prosecutors, police training, and coordinated state police intelligence.
Flynn says that is necessary because "We have cases where we have defendants who are also being charged like in Livingston County and Monroe County and they're going back and forth across counties stealing all over the place."
This state plan also allows business tax credits for stores to upgrade security
Unfortunately consumers all pay for this since stores have to recover some of the costs and that dives prices higher. And now more tax dollars must be used for the issue as well.