Staff photo / Dan Pompili... A security vehicle makes its way around the parking lot of the Boardman Walmart during the bustling shopping season last week. The retail giant is a common target for shoplifters, but police Chief Todd Werth said the township’s theft numbers are down overall for the year.

The story of retail theft in Mahoning County is a tale of two townships. Most of the buying — either at big box stores or smaller establishments — happens in Austintown and Boardman.

There are clear similarities in how police address shoplifting but stark differences in actual numbers between the communities, if only due to the higher traffic and greater number of stores in Boardman.

“Theft has been consistent, and certainly we see more instances during the holidays, just more volume,” said Boardman police Chief Todd Werth. “Where Boardman’s concerned, addressing retail theft is one of our major priorities and we spend a lot of resources on that.”

While Boardman’s call volume remains generally higher than Austintown’s, both have seen an overall decrease in shoplifting and other types of theft.

Boardman police provided year-round numbers — up to the week before Christmas for 2023 — for four of the township’s major retailers: Walmart, Meijer, Lowe’s and Home Depot.

Only Lowe’s saw a significant year-over-year increase, both in calls for service (128 in 2023 compared with 103 in 2022) and thefts (52 this year compared with 33 last year).

Calls to Home Depot were slightly up, but thefts were slightly down.

Meijer and Walmart both saw decreases in calls and theft reports, although Walmart still draws the most police responses of all four.

This year, Walmart drew 515 calls for service, of which 229 were for theft reports. That number is down from 559 calls for service, of which 299 were thefts.

Holiday theft numbers are more difficult to ascertain. Information provided by Boardman did not include comparisons specifically for the holiday shopping season.

The Vindicator’s police blotters for Boardman show only 13 arrests for shoplifting and one for fraudulent use of a credit card, all at Walmart, between Nov. 22 and Dec. 19.

Austintown Lt. Shawn Hevener said retail theft is not a major concern for the department.

“Shoplifting is not a massively taxing problem,” he said. “Thefts at Walmart are down historically. Home Depot is running more loss prevention and there’s 20 more apprehensions, but overall I don’t see much of an uptick.”

Hevener said much of the activity in Austintown has been outside of the stores — auto thefts and break-ins, stolen license plates and purses, and other “crimes of opportunity.”

AUSTINTOWN

Austintown police provided year-over-year comparisons for Walmart and Home Depot.

The numbers at Walmart stayed consistent — 116 thefts in 2022, and 114 up to the week before Christmas this year.

At Home Depot, the numbers increased from 38 last year to 57 this year.

The Vindicator’s files from Nov. 8 to Dec. 14, show only two shoplifting arrests at Tractor Supply and three thefts reported at Walmart.

A report from Austintown’s dispatch center showed that theft reports at Walmart between Nov. 24 and Dec. 20 stayed at six from 2022 to 2023, and dropped from four to one at Home Depot.

“Our numbers are down compared to what they used to be,” Hevener said. “It’s never been as slow as this, except for the beginning of COVID. And a lot of stores are locking merchandise down now, especially at Home Depot.”

Only Meijer responded to requests for comment for this story, and then only said that the company does not comment on matters of security.

However, while the businesses themselves may not comment on the matter, Werth said police have good relationships with retail locations in the township.

“A lot of our statistics for those thefts are driven by proactive loss prevention departments,” Werth said.

“For example, Walmart and Meijer have very good loss prevention, and they’re able to detect the theft and pursue it, and then they get us the information and they do follow-up.”

Hevener said many stores in Austintown do not have dedicated loss prevention departments.

“If they catch a shoplifter, they catch them, but we might go three weeks without a theft at Walmart being reported,” he said.

Hevener said many stores rely on regular staff to handle loss prevention, and that can make it difficult to keep it under control and provide data to police. He also said stores do not necessarily report every incident to police.

“We have other stores, like Giant Eagle and Marc’s, that have loss prevention staff, but we have no stats for them,” Hevener said. “But our officers working security there don’t seem to have too many thefts. I’d say Tractor Supply is the next highest in terms of them catching and us arresting shoplifters. We actually had a kid ride his bike around that store stealing.”

Hevener said a lot of retail theft, even during the holidays, isn’t necessarily about people stealing Christmas gifts. Hevener and Werth both said their data do not distinguish between shoplifting and someone simply reporting a missing or stolen wallet.

Hevener said many thefts take the form of fraudulent returns.

“Most of the thefts you’re seeing are drug users looking for things they can sell for drugs,” he said.

Some thieves will find a receipt in a garbage can, find the item in the store, and then try to return it. Others will try switching stickers, taking a $0.25 sticker from a swatch of fabric and sticking it on a high-priced item. In other cases, people will outright steal high-priced items like paint or flooring, then attempt to return them.

“That’s the biggest problem we deal with, next to just stealing the item,” he said.

RETAIL THEFT RINGS

A case in Boardman highlights what Hevener is talking about.

On Nov. 20, Boardman police arrested Jessica Johnson, 38, of Glenaven Avenue in Youngstown. From July through November, Johnson allegedly stole more than $4,200 worth of merchandise from Lowe’s and Walmart, either through fraud or outright shoplifting.

She stands accused of stealing a total of $1,300 worth of merchandise from Walmart on four occasions over the summer, often returning it fraudulently for cash or store credit. Items stolen from both stores include 5-gallon buckets of paint, boxes of vinyl flooring and a Weber grill.

Johnson is set for a pretrial hearing Jan. 16 in Mahoning County Boardman Court.

Hevener also said a retail theft ring out of New York recently was active in the area, stealing electrical breakers valued at $4,000 to $5,000 apiece.

“By the time everyone knows they’re here, they’re already gone,” he said.

Werth said such groups are rare, though. While groups like the Felony Lane Gang have been responsible for smash-and-grab auto break-ins, and low-level offenders driven by an internet trend have targeted Kia and Hyundai vehicles in the county, retail rings are not a major problem.

“In the Mahoning Valley, we haven’t seen the organized retail theft that we’re seeing out West,” Werth said. “It’s been a priority of ours to investigate anything like that.”

Werth and Hevener said their departments try to remain vigilant and work closely with the Mahoning County Prosecutor’s Office.

“We do not soft book anyone for theft. For every theft, we conduct an arrest, and the goal there is to not let it get out of hand, and we do focus on repeat offenders and work with the prosecutor’s office,” Werth said. “That’s one thing that keeps a lid on it to some extent, is that we enforce the state theft statutes.”

Werth and Hevener also said the increases they have noticed have been at stores that use self-scan checkouts.

“There are people who are down and out who steal Christmas presents, there are those who think it’s not a big deal, and there are those with the intent to steal,” Hevener said.

In any case, self-checkout stations make it easier.

“It’s not so easy if you’re standing there with a human being checking you out,” Werth said. “While (self-scan) is convenient, it also lends itself to theft, which impacts our resources.”

NILES

It is a different story in Trumbull County, where the Niles Police Department from Nov. 22 to Dec. 20 received 25 calls for shoplifting at the Eastwood Mall, 14 more than last year.

“A lot of stores deal with shoplifting in different ways,” said Joe Bell, corporate communications director for the Cafaro Company, which owns the Eastwood Mall. “Some stores deal with it harsher, others not as confrontational. But there’s come a push among retailers everywhere to cut this off. A lot of our retailers are becoming more serious.”

Niles as a whole received 508 total calls for theft or shoplifting in 2022. Of those 508 calls, Capt. John Marshall said a large portion came near the end of the year.

The exact number of calls per location in 2022 could not be confirmed through records.

Bell did recall an incident at the mall in early December that involved a 14-year-old boy grabbing a decorative Salvation Army kettle near one of the entrances, but security took him and others involved into custody within minutes.

“Shoplifters have been around forever,” Bell said. “They have always been the bad part of retailing, it’s a drag. But we’re fortunate at Eastwood Mall in that we don’t get these small mobs of people smashing and grabbing. And we have a really good relationship with Niles and Cortland police.”

Bell continued, “So we make sure that people are aware they would be caught. People don’t want to feel uncomfortable in the store, so seeing many officers makes them feel they’re in good hands.”

Marshall said some thefts during the holidays are not “as big” as others, and that shoplifters don’t necessarily look for any particular types of gifts. He added, “It’s usually just people taking whatever they were looking for.”

“During holiday time, we do station officers (around the mall) because of the volume of people in that area,” Marshall said. “Not always for theft, but all other sorts of things. In the area of businesses on or around 422, through Thanksgiving, Christmas and the beginning of the new year, because that is the busiest part of the area.”

Reporter Daniel Newman contributed to this report.