Needing to vent about local WoO/PoSes

[Johnnie Lyle]

Sacramento is having a spate of breakins at gaming and comic book stores. Two of the game stores I frequent had breakins in the last few days. One lost about 10K in Pokémon and Magic cards, though that PoS was caught, for all the good that does, given California’s ridiculously insufficient punishment for theft. The other took a cinderblock through a window, then the WoO got spooked and ran like a scared little bitch. This one was not apprehended.

The cinderblock is now being added to the D&D terrain set.

RUMINT is that somebody is scouting out local game/comic/hobby shops and is directing the mooks where to rob, but not what to take.

It’s frustrating because game stores are always on the edge of profitability, and many go under. There’s absolutely no margin, and the thefts are purely due to greed.

[Poohbah]

Sacramento is having a spate of breakins at gaming and comic book stores. Two of the game stores I frequent had breakins in the last few days. One lost about 10K in Pokémon and Magic cards, though that PoS was caught, for all the good that does, given California’s ridiculously insufficient punishment for theft. The other took a cinderblock through a window, then the WoO got spooked and ran like a scared little bitch. This one was not apprehended.

The cinderblock is now being added to the D&D terrain set.

RUMINT is that somebody is scouting out local game/comic/hobby shops and is directing the mooks where to rob, but not what to take.

It’s frustrating because game stores are always on the edge of profitability, and many go under. There’s absolutely no margin, and the thefts are purely due to greed.

A not-very-nice part of me is wondering if the ringleader owns a store and is knocking off the competition.

[Johnnie Lyle]

Sacramento is having a spate of breakins at gaming and comic book stores. Two of the game stores I frequent had breakins in the last few days. One lost about 10K in Pokémon and Magic cards, though that PoS was caught, for all the good that does, given California’s ridiculously insufficient punishment for theft. The other took a cinderblock through a window, then the WoO got spooked and ran like a scared little bitch. This one was not apprehended.

The cinderblock is now being added to the D&D terrain set.

RUMINT is that somebody is scouting out local game/comic/hobby shops and is directing the mooks where to rob, but not what to take.

It’s frustrating because game stores are always on the edge of profitability, and many go under. There’s absolutely no margin, and the thefts are purely due to greed.

A not-very-nice part of me is wondering if the ringleader owns a store and is knocking off the competition.

Always a disconcerting possibility, but less likely than your run of the mill retail theft gang.The local stores generally have different clientele without much overlap, so they compete less with each other than it first appears. They have already identified two levels of mook - one casing the place and the others doing the robbing. They have no real familiarity with the product they’re stealing, and miss a lot of the good stuff. They also have no familiarity with the community or the atmosphere of a game store. The temptation to overegg the pudding is hard to resist, especially for an amateur mastermind.

[Belushi TD]

Do the WoO happen to have a plan by which they gain from their misdeeds, or is it akin to the Underpants Gnomes of South Park fame?

1. Steal underpants

2. ???

3. PROFIT!

Knowing what Step 2 is would probably get you very close to solving the whole thing.

Belushi TD

[Johnnie Lyle]

Do the WoO happen to have a plan by which they gain from their misdeeds, or is it akin to the Underpants Gnomes of South Park fame?

1. Steal underpants

2. ???

3. PROFIT!

Knowing what Step 2 is would probably get you very close to solving the whole thing.

Belushi TD

San Francisco has a very well developed fence network, especially in the Tenderloin. They routinely have the tweakers shoplift, take the goods off their hands very cheaply, and then plug it into nationwide or even international wholesale networks, who then sell it on Amazon or ebay. A lot of the flash mob snatch and grabs work similarly.

Stuff like new Pokémon or Magic packs is easy to plug into these networks.

It’s very well documented and yet another example of the problems caused by not treating theft as a serious crime.