At a mall outside Milwaukee, parents must escort their teens on weekends because of rampant shoplifting there.
In St. Louis, Las Vegas and Philadelphia, text-messaging “flash mobs” of youths have swooped into stores, stealing merchandise and running away.
And here in Chicago, shoplifting arrests of juveniles have jumped in the police district that includes the Magnificent Mile — even though retail-theft arrests as a whole have fallen slightly.
Chicago’s juvenile theft problem gained a high profile earlier this year when stores on North Michigan Avenue were repeatedly targeted by large groups of young shoplifters.
Random shoplifting? No mention yet of the unprovoked beatings and strong armed robberies that are becoming endemic to the downtown area. We figure in another year or two, they might mention that a battery occurred at some point.