Police Launch Special Operation To Crackdown On Shoplifting

South Australia Police have launched an operation established to crack down on shop lifting as the state experiences an increase in thievery.

There has been a significant increase in shoplifting activity across South Australia with beauty products, alcohol and expensive meat some of the main targets.

South Australia Police believe the sudden increase in thievery is as a result of the rising cost of living.

According to recent figures, over the course of a year to the end of July there were 12,967 shop lifting incidents recorded.

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This is a 31 percent increase from the previous year.

In response to the increase, police have established Operation Measure which aims to target reoffenders.

The operation has so far been responsible for the arrest of 250 shoplifters since it was established in March. 

Operations coordinator for SAPOL’s operations service Inspector Julian Coram told Adelaide Now that a majority of the crimes are being committed by reoffenders.

“We know that a small amount of people are responsible for quite a high percentage of retail crime. We have focused on those individuals who are committing the top end of the offending,”

- Inspector Julian Coram

“We have had people for 10, 15, up to 30 offences at one time.”

Mr Coram said that police are also enforcing barring orders in some cases to prevent offenders from visiting certain locations.

“We are using intelligence to identify who are the repeat offenders are and which stores are victim to repeat thefts and are working with them to put crime prevention measures in place,’’ he said.

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