Clark County sheriff’s deputies arrested eight people last week during an operation in Orchards to crack down on retail theft.
It was the agency’s second retail theft operation this month. Earlier, deputies and detectives from several units at the sheriff’s office arrested a dozen people during a sting in Hazel Dell.
The June 14 operation was at the Orchards Fred Meyer, 7411 N.E. 117th Ave. The eight people arrested were booked into the Clark County Jail for retail theft-related crimes and outstanding warrants, according to a sheriff’s office news release.
Among the items stolen were alcohol, a KitchenAid mixer, a hoverboard, beauty products, an area rug, electronics, power tools, clothing and propane tanks, according to the news release.
Some of the items were stolen via skip-scanning, a form of shoplifting where people use the self-checkout but don’t pay for all of their items. These actions are captured by store security cameras, which allow loss prevention officers to identify regular offenders and build theft cases against them, the news release states.
In addition to skip-scanning, detectives frequently investigate cases where shoplifting suspects attempt to return stolen merchandise for store gift cards. Many of these retail theft subjects are part of organized theft rings and associated with other criminal activities, such as drug distribution, vehicle theft and illegal firearm possession, the sheriff’s office said.
The sheriff’s office said it intends to do more operations in other parts of the county.
