THE SHOPLIFTER.

Gisborne Times, Volume LVI, Issue 6318, 22 February 1922, Page 3

THE SHOPLIFTER.

A STUDY IN PSYCHOLOGY. PRECAUTIONS OF BUSINESS MEN. “The shop-lifter, like the poor, wo have always with os, though there is not necessarily much connection between the two, and quite often there is none at all. Still, for a ' town of this size, there is probably less of that sort of thing going on than anywhere else in the Dominion.” Tims a prominent business man of Gisborne, in answer to, an enquiry as to the prevalence cf petty thieving from his establishment. The reason he .assigned for the limited extent of the evil was that Gisborne had a much smaller floating population, due to its isolation, than most other towns, and consequently possessed fewer representatives of that class of individual who preyed illegally upon society. Even so, there was, lie said, a steady leakage, which the utmost care was unable to eradicate entirely, and the question was one which was causing business people a good deal of thought. It was generally agreed that prevention being better than cure, the efforts of. the management of any shop should be directed towards the prevention cf thieving rather than to its detection, and to this end employees were enjoined to maintain the greatest vigilance throughout the performance of their duties. Most shops nowadays were well provided with mirrors'set at different angles, which served many purposes, notably those of decoration and lighting,' hut which also enabled the staff to keep all parts of tlio premises constantly under observation. Then anyone who is seen unobtrusively stowing merchandise about his or her person, is quietly approached by the assistant and asked if bo can have the honor of writing out a sale docket fur the article in question. The brazen effrontery with which some; people face such a situation, sau'i the informant, fills one with mournful admiration, and makes one sigh for the wasted talents which might have won enduring fame behind the footlights. But, of course, he continued/ it is impossible to always catch the culprit rod-liandcd, and he lias then, generally, to he given the benefit of the doubt. It frequently occurred that an assistant upon looking over his stock after serving a customer, found that something was missing, and was quite certain in his own mind that a particular person was responsible; but it was a very scrions thing to make a charge of theft without absolute proof, and the result was that no action could be taken, and tho firm had to stand the loss. And in this respect, proprietors were sometimes shocked to observe who it was upon whom suspicion rested, people who could certainly well afford to pay for what they wanted, and who had always basked in the warm glow of respectability, and continued to bask in it after the commission of their apparently- undetected misdemeanors.

All this, said the business man, brings m? to that extremely interesting and much discussed question, of the more obscure motives which lead people to commit crime. In the case of shop-lifting, those who indulge in the practice may be roughly classified into three groups, the really needy, who can be lorgiven; the kleptomaniac, who can bo understood; and the others—who at first thought can he neither forgiven nor understood. Kleptomania is a mere or less constant condition, and its victims can never be trusted within range of moveable property without risk. These other people,' however, who, without apparent cause seem to .succumb to a sudden temptation and steal, and who, having stolen once, may not do it again for months or years, present by far the most difficult, and therefore the most interesting problem for solution. Alost criminologists now agree that it is part of that same weird and unaccountable impulse in human nature which makes some people, when right- up against something which every dictate of reason and common-sense shrieks that they should not do—do just that very thing. It is that impulse which makes a person standing on the top of a high building, grip the parapet with both hands to keep from stepping out into space and eternity, cr that makes him shrink back in a cold sweat at the swift temptation to fling himself on the track in front of a charging railway engine. People who are perfectly sane in every way, have described how, picking „up a leaded gun, they have pointed it at someone and felt "an almost irresistible desire to fire it off, cut of some inane desire to see what would happen ; there have been cases where people have yielded to this inclination and perhaps murdered their closest friend, yet for the life of them they could advance no earthly reason why they did the deed. In the same way there are people who, in a shop, seeing themselves surrounded by different goods, are suddenly assailed with a desire to steal them, and, yielding almost before their moral resistance has time to junction, are, if caught branded as criminals, and if not, perhaps pursue their righteous paths to the end of a blameless life. It is all very strange and very sad, and brings us up against sueli questions as fate and freewill, but whatever else it is, it is unfortunately a fact.”