Pro Shoplifting is Risky Big Business

A San Marcos couple who confessed on national TV last year to being "professional shoplifters" are not the only ones making a living from crime, the North County Times reported.

"Especially when we're dealing with organized theft, the majority goes undetected by retail stores and law enforcement ---- and more people get away than get caught," said Joe LaRocca, senior asset protection advisor with the National Retail Federation, a trade association.

Local investigators turned their attention to Laura and Matthew Eaton in the summer of 2008, when the couple was suspected of stealing a single Lego brand toy from the Target store in Vista, the paper reported.

Now the pair are suspected of a breed of theft that industry experts and law enforcement officials believe deprives retailers of between $15 billion and $30 billion a year. Those figures don't include the increased costs to consumers and loss of state sales tax revenues.

The pair has not been arrested or charged with any crime and their attorneys have not returned calls for comment.

So-called organized retail theft has the attention of lawmakers. Three bills targeting the issue are before Congress and a few states already have their own legislation.

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