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Punched, spat at and abused by shoplifters

Punched, spat at and abused by shoplifters

Released Wednesday, 24th April 2024
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Punched, spat at and abused by shoplifters

Punched, spat at and abused by shoplifters

Punched, spat at and abused by shoplifters

Punched, spat at and abused by shoplifters

Wednesday, 24th April 2024
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0:00

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dot Com slash Weight Loss.

1:14

Bbc Sounds Music Radio

1:17

podcast. If you're going to

1:19

work in a shop today, or hospital,

1:21

emergency department, or railway station, or any

1:23

place where you're likely to come across

1:25

members of the public, there is a

1:27

chance much greater than zero that you

1:29

will encounter anger and aggravation, sometimes worse.

1:32

What we're told by people who do

1:34

these jobs is that it's got a

1:36

lot worse. Recently I'm and were been

1:38

on the Today programme, our reporter Jim

1:40

Connelly, went to meet shop workers in

1:42

West Yorkshire who are bearing the brunt

1:44

of all of this starting at a

1:46

pet shop in Halifax. Daylight

1:49

is pretty much the exact same People you

1:51

just know it for your eyes are drawn

1:53

to them straight. are you looking for? Matthew

1:55

is the manager. Paw prints a pet shop

1:58

here in Halifax A is row after. row

2:00

of pet food, dog toys, there's a guinea

2:02

pig in the corner, there is everything you

2:04

could possibly need no matter what animal you

2:07

are. Matthew you you

2:09

ultimately look like you're ready if someone is gonna

2:11

come and shoplift. Describe what you're wearing for it.

2:13

The standard body cam and then

2:15

in the middle of that we have the shoplink

2:17

radio on. Tell us how we

2:19

are, for just double checking you've got my radio request.

2:21

So what's that for? If someone's like

2:23

suspected of shoplifting, someone has shoplifted,

2:26

they'll basically put out and say this

2:28

person's been in the store. Nothing

2:30

to do with whiskey

2:33

Charlie. There you go.

2:35

Right on cue. They're all resting for

2:37

a great accent. I've just been so

2:39

many shoplifted in here before, he's keeping

2:42

an eye on it. I've had one

2:44

specific shoplifter and she has been

2:46

rife in the past like six

2:48

years. She wears disguises,

2:50

she wants for a full like

2:53

burka, so basically she'll shoplifted from

2:55

somewhere, she'll go somewhere else and she'll change

2:57

into an outfit. She wears wigs, glasses,

2:59

everything, she tries it. Do you ever

3:02

get a situation where they get aggressive

3:04

with you? Yeah many times. So

3:06

I'll give you a couple examples. A

3:09

man and a woman came in and I caught his wife

3:11

stealing dog toys. So I confronted

3:13

her about them. The man was so aggressive to

3:15

the point where he told me that he'd be

3:17

waiting for me at five o'clock when I finished

3:19

work. We've had a guy try and steal something,

3:21

go and sit on the dog beds outside and

3:24

then when we asked him to move along he

3:26

actually came in throwing the dog beds in the

3:28

store at the staff. He

3:30

like literally the top shelves he just cleared them

3:32

off of his hand, he was throwing treats at

3:35

us. The moment you catch them they do get

3:37

quite aggressive. Is that scary? Because

3:40

I mean that you're not the biggest

3:42

guy in the world here. Not to

3:44

judge you or anything. Absolutely not. It's

3:46

really intimidating. It can also depend on

3:48

who you're on staff force with, everything

3:50

like that. Who knows? Thank you. Did

3:53

you see it at all? No, that's how I

3:55

feel. Yeah. After

3:59

a morning getting a Matthew's feet it's time to

4:01

move on. Port

4:04

Prints is a small chain of shops owned

4:06

by Darren. It's singing after birthday. That's

4:09

Spitz. Spitz has been

4:11

with us 12 years now, left to us

4:13

by a customer. You're the

4:15

boss, you're on the whole chain. How

4:18

big an impact has shoplifting been in the last

4:20

year or two? It used to be petty pilfer

4:22

and now it's not. Now they're coming in with

4:25

rucksacks, big bags, bags for life and

4:27

they're just clearing shelves. Can you give us a

4:29

sense of the financial impact? We probably write off about

4:31

$5,000 a year. Personal. Personal.

4:39

When they're hitting you twice a week, clearing

4:41

a shelf of dog treats at £9.99 a

4:43

packet, they're taking 20 or 30 packets. That's

4:46

big money in one hit. We've

4:50

taken a short drive from Halifax to spend

4:52

the afternoon in Leeds. The city

4:55

got described as the country's shoplifting capital recently, with

4:58

more reports of it happening here than anywhere

5:00

else. We're at a co-op. Last

5:03

year the chain said it averaged 1,000 incidents

5:05

every day across its 2,400 stores. My

5:10

name's David Hopkins, I'm from the street co-op. How are you

5:12

doing, David? Hi, Jamie. Where's the best place to stand?

5:14

Probably just down this way. Right. How

5:19

often is it happening in your shop here? Yeah, I mean I've

5:21

worked in retail 20 years. It's always been really bad. In the

5:23

task of a few years it's just got worse and worse. People

5:25

come coming in massive gangs or just a couple

5:28

of people with huge bags each, suitcases like rubble

5:30

sacks, anything where they can get the maximum amount

5:32

of front of the shelf as quick as possible.

5:35

It's definitely not petty crime, you know, it's

5:37

organised crime that makes our customers and colleagues

5:39

feel really unface. Have you ever been physically

5:41

abused during your job? Yeah,

5:43

I've had a number of incidents where I've been either

5:45

punched or we had an

5:48

incident where a couple of

5:50

women felt it was needed to dig the

5:52

nails into my scalp and scrape it all

5:54

down my face so I had cuts on

5:56

my forehead, even spitting, It

5:59

might not seem serious. People boys discussing our suicides

6:01

discussed the known as fits the soul of people

6:03

don't seem to think is an assault was the

6:05

best place makes us down than that. Observed as

6:08

Billie perfectly a catch it we're about. I give.

6:11

Myself an hour scum by. I'm

6:14

no expert in shuttle offense bobbing what's around on.

6:16

Seen any signs of any kind of yeah missing

6:19

class you have a regular go fast them and

6:21

I will have hidden bombs and seen that I

6:23

got some so when they have kept walking which

6:25

is which has good to discern at The security

6:27

guard seems to be working pretty well for David

6:29

and his team and it was really quiet for

6:31

the next couple of hours. And. Then something

6:33

happened just out with us I guess so

6:35

are we being the side and will just

6:38

optimal coming Madonna second nile on them and

6:40

see i cooked meat shelf thirty six six

6:42

pounds worth of cooked meat strains his back

6:44

am and i was surprised that it off

6:46

and bought a series of the first the

6:48

god is realized it and it's not worth

6:50

any their his hundred the suppose a movie

6:52

do without do think coming to the nazi

6:54

got hands wait for the about twenty fucking

6:56

some ham that's not really sets of Cairo

6:59

known as the second i went to south

7:01

so whether that be in one hundred dollars.

7:03

And sell all the selling products. Get the money

7:05

and use that money said so that your of

7:07

issues. By

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this is a mole and Nick our

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we are jumping on this fee to

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tell you that a bit about our

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