Police in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, arrested more than 50 people last week after a mass robbery in which groups of robbers appeared to work together, breaking into stores, filling bags with goods and fleeing.
The flash mobstyle looting on Tuesday evening the 26th was another episode that added to a growing list of organized robberies, possibly fueled by social media, that are spreading across the United States, particularly in Pennsylvania and California.
The robberies have gone viral on social media, with videos of people, often wearing hoods and masks that cover their faces, knocking over shelves, filling bags or bags with stolen products and running out of the store with the items.
As cases of this type of crime continue to rise across the country, retailers have seen a dramatic increase in financial losses associated with thefts. A survey released last week by the United States National Retail Federation found that crimerelated financial losses reached $112.1 billion in 2022, a figure well above the $93.9 billion in 2021.
Dozens of Philadelphia stores attacked
The crimes came after a peaceful protest over a judge’s decision to dismiss murder and other charges against a Philadelphia police officer who shot driver Eddie Irizarry through a rolledup window. Those involved in the looting were not part of the protest, Acting Police Commissioner John Stanford said at a news conference, calling the group “a bunch of criminal opportunists.”
Shortly before 8 p.m., a large number of young people were in the commercial corridor of downtown Philadelphia, called Center City, and some police officers stopped a group of men who were “dressed in black and wearing masks,” according to a police statement.
At that moment, emergency calls came in about the Foot Locker store. When police arrived, they discovered the location had been searched “as part of a coordinated attack,” the release said. At 8:12 p.m., police responded to similar calls at Lululemon. Shortly afterward, calls directed police to Apple, where they made off with phones and tablets — then threw them to the ground when they realized the devices were disabled and their alarms were going off.
At least 18 stateowned liquor stores were raided, prompting the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board to close all 48 retail stores in Philadelphia and one in suburban Cheltenham on Wednesday. No employees were injured, but “some were understandably shaken,” said Shawn Kelly, spokesman for the liquor board.
The robberies stretched from downtown to Northeast and West Philadelphia, leaving behind broken windows and broken store roofs. Six stores in a single shopping center in North Philadelphia were looted, including three pharmacies, a beauty salon, an accounting firm and a cell phone store. Benjamin Nochum, pharmacist and store manager at Patriot Pharmacy, said it is the third time since 2020 that his company has been affected.
According to Philadelphia authorities, people appeared to have organized their efforts on social media. The police are investigating “that there may have been a caravan of several different vehicles traveling from one place to another.” A video posted on social media showed people hanging from cars in a shopping center parking lot and appearing to shout instructions to each other.
“This destructive and illegal behavior cannot and will not be tolerated in our city,” said Mayor Jim Kenney, a Democrat, calling it a “disgusting display of opportunistic criminal activity.” His administration is working with police to assess “which areas of the city may need increased coverage or additional resources,” he said.
Los Angeles set up a “task force.”
The Philadelphia robberies occurred on the same day that Target announced it would close nine stores in four states, including one in New York’s East Harlem and three in California’s San Francisco Bay Area.
“Before making this decision, we invested heavily in strategies to prevent and deter retail theft and organized crime in our stores, such as: “Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we continue to face fundamental challenges in operating these businesses safely and successfully,” the statement said Chain.
On Thursday the 28th, a Nike store in Irvine, California was attacked by four young people, including a 14yearold teenager who fled with approximately $3,000 worth of clothing, including hoodies, pants, shirts and Bras. Sports . Local police reported that they believe the suspects are part of an organized crime group in the area that has already stolen around $11,000 worth of goods.
In August, a similar robbery occurred at a shopping center in the Canoga Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, in which about 30 suspects broke into a Nordstrom store, an American luxury department store chain, looted shelves and displays, taking nearly $1,000 worth of goods of $300,000. That same week, an Yves Saint Laurent store, also in Los Angeles, was robbed by around 30 people who fled with at least $400,000 worth of merchandise.
The robberies led to the creation of a task force against organized crime in Los Angeles. Multiple agencies, including the Los Angeles Police Department and the California Highway Patrol, were involved in the mission to curb the crimes and arrest those involved.
Episodes repeat cases from 2021
The latest chaos is reminiscent of robberies in late 2021, particularly in the San Francisco Bay Area, where organized groups of thieves, some carrying crowbars and hammers, systematically targeted luxury stores.
That’s when groups of people broke into stores including Louis Vuitton, Burberry and Bloomingdale’s in the city center and in Union Square, an upscale shopping area popular with tourists and full of Christmas shoppers. The robberies are believed to be part of sophisticated criminal networks that recruited mostly young people to steal goods and then sell them online.
“We are not talking about someone who needs money or food. These are people who go out and do this for the big bucks and the excitement,” said Ben Dugan, then president of the Law Enforcement and Retail Coalition. (With information from Estadão Conteúdo/AP)