Female shoplifters caught on camera

Several supermarkets have complained that social customs enable women to steal with impunity.
Muhammad Hamouda, sales manager at an electrical accessories company, said 70 percent of thefts in his shop are made by females, primarily stealing women’s accessories.
Most thefts are monitored on closed-circuit TVs, which have also revealed various tricks of these thieves, particularly women with large handbags into which laptops, devices for hair and body care can be concealed. Only female security staff at supermarkets can deal with women thieves.
Hamouda said: “Mostly shops do not complain to police, but demand a written confession with a copy of her identity card, and then let her go free. But there are also shops that make her pay double the price of the article she shoplifted and she is prohibited against stepping inside the shop in future,” he said, adding that some ladies deny the charges and threaten to call the Haia as a means of defense.
Muhammad Asiri, a salesman in Asir, said there were suspicious disappearances of women’s accessories such perfumes, vanity bags and rings, discovered at the end of the month. Guards do not notice anything because the missing articles were mostly light and can be easily hidden. Occasionally there are gangs of women involved in these thefts, Asiri said.
Amal Saleh, a housewife, said, “I have noticed incidents of thefts in some stores where female thieves bring along their friends on joint operations. I have also seen some mothers training their daughters in the art shoplifting.”
Jeweler Yaslam Muhammad said shoplifting jewelry is not easy as the security is tight in such establishments. He said that women’s clothes such as the abaya are good for hiding stolen articles.
Asir police spokesman Lt. Col. Abdullah Zafran said it is not easy for a store owner to prove theft by a woman or remove stolen goods hidden in her clothing. He stressed the need to put fool-proof monitoring systems in place in all commercial centers.
A family and community medical consultant in Asir, Dr. Yahya Al-Khaldi, said there is no justification for stealing by men or women. “Poverty or unemployment makes some women turn to stealing,” he said. He also said that providing employment opportunities for women on the one hand and enforcing strict surveillance at commercial centers on the other would solve the problem.
In his view some shops demand high prices for certain articles needed by women which could be another reason for thefts in these shops. However, there are some psychological disorders involving compulsions to steal, he added.