Hundreds of women and children are being trafficked to Britain by criminal gangs to shoplift, according to BBC research. The retailer initiative Retailers Against Crime (RAC) is monitoring 56 gangs alone, as boss Maxine Fraser told the public broadcaster. Dozens of people have already been sentenced to prison. After their release, they would immediately resume the thefts, the report said on Tuesday. Dozens of women and children would have to live in dirty apartments.
Retailers in Great Britain have been complaining about an “epidemic of shoplifting” for some time. The trade association British Retail Consortium estimated the damage last year at 953 million British pounds (around 1.11 billion euros). The number of incidents increased by 25 percent compared to the previous year.
Security expert Adam Ratcliff, who has analyzed hundreds of hours of surveillance cameras and identified links between the gangs, told the BBC the groups were targeting items such as expensive cosmetics. “You go in with five, six, seven people at a time. They open the drawers and fill their pockets.” The target is also the keys to the storage rooms. Men are also involved, but they usually coordinate the operations from a distance. (dpa)