Bold shoplifters cause increase in fear level
Slain stock clerk often encountered brazen thieves at work, family says
When Manny Huizar came home from his job on the overnight shift stocking shelves at a San Jose Safeway, he often showed his three brothers videos of him catching shoplifters as they tried to get away with baskets of liquor and groceries.
Some of the footage captured Huizar stopping thieves at the door before they left the store, his family said. Other times, the videos he copied on his phone from Safeway's security cameras showed the 24-year-old pushing a full grocery cart back into the store after confronting a suspect who made it as far as the parking lot.
“He did it a lot of times,” said one of his brothers, Jose Huizar. “He didn't like it when people would steal from the store. He just took it seriously and maybe he took it personally. I know from co-workers and friends that everybody would tell him, `Hey, it's not worth it.'”
On June 5, at 3:35 a.m., after a confrontation with a thief in the liquor aisle, Huizar was shot dead — a tragedy that comes amid a fraught time and fierce debate over crime in America's cities.
Frustration over highly publicized, brazen thefts at supermarkets, pharmacies and retail stores is filling social media. There's a growing sense that the thieves are becoming more emboldened — and that nobody is taking responsibility.
“People are getting so sick and tired of this behavior happening over and over and over again,” said Rachel Michelin, CEO and president of the California Retailers Association that has lobbied for stiffer consequences. “Every day citizens are going to start taking the law into their own hands. My fear is that we're going to see many more of these types of situations happening across the state.”
Over recent months, accounts of shoplifting at Walgreens and CVS and other retail outlets have placed a spotlight on California's Prop 47, a voter-approved measure that in 2015 began lowering the penalty for thefts of less than $950 from a felony to a misdemeanor. Supporters say the law is not to blame. Data — which has been criticized as incomplete — shows no sustained increase in property crimes since the law took effect.
But critics say look no further than Google for “shoplifting in California” — one of the most frequent related searches that pops up is “How much can you steal in California without getting in trouble?”
Since word of the June 5 shooting spread through the upscale Willow Glen neighborhood last weekend, the sidewalk in front of Safeway has become a growing memorial where Huizar's family has spent every day embracing shoppers offering flowers and condolences.
“People keep coming,” said Huizar's mother, Marisela Cornejo, who kept vigil until midnight recently.
Family and friends describe Huizar, the youngest of the four brothers and a sister, as talkative and generous, someone who “wouldn't hurt a fly,” and so big-hearted he was almost “nerdy.”
“He helped me take my groceries to the car,” shopper Gilda Alvarado told Huizar's mother, clutching her hand through the window of her SUV. “He always said hello.”
Details of the confrontation are still unclear. A few days after the shooting, the only sign that something was amiss at the Safeway store was a security guard wearing a bulletproof vest and the store's top wine shelf wiped clean of the most expensive cabernets.
Police would only say that Huizar had been in “an altercation prior to the shooting” with an adult male, who is still on the loose. Huizar's brother Jose said he still has “a thousand questions.”
One of Huizar's co-workers, who also stocks shelves and asked not to be named, said that store management warns employees not to confront shoplifters. Still, he said, it was routine for him and Huizar to casually mention to suspicious-looking people in the liquor aisle after 2 a.m. that “`Sorry, it's too late for liquor sales' and hope it will deter them from doing anything.”
Sometimes, he said, the attention is enough for would-be shoplifters to panic and leave. Other times, “they'll walk in and walk out with shopping carts full. We say you can't leave with that, but they always say, `You can't touch me, you can't chase us.'”
Shoplifting incidents rarely turn deadly. But last year, a Rite Aid employee in Los Angeles was killed when he confronted thieves stealing cases of beer.
The year after Prop. 47 became law, crime statistics showed a 9% jump in larceny — including a notable increase in shoplifting and vehicle break-ins — but that returned to previous levels the following year, according to Magnus Lofstrom, criminal justice policy director at the Public Policy Institute of California.
It's not clear, however, whether the prevalence of shoplifting truly declined from 2015 to 2016 as the data suggests, Lofstrom said, or whether retailers simply reported it less often. Either way, “the crime data shows that California is not unique,” he said, and “this is part of something that is experienced in other places in the country as well.”
Michelin from the Retailers Association says the true scope of the problem doesn't show up in crime data.
“It's this merry-go-round where retailers say, `Well, we're not going to report them because when we have called, the police don't show up,'” she said. “The police don't show up because they say the district attorneys won't prosecute. The district attorneys say they don't prosecute because the police aren't bringing in the cases. The police say we're not bringing the cases because the retailers aren't reporting them.”
The retail association isn't advocating the repeal of Prop. 47, she said, just fixing it. For instance, she said, the misdemeanor could be raised to a felony after multiple thefts by the same person total more than $950.
It's time, she said, “for our elected leaders to take this seriously.”
Huizar's family doesn't know whom to blame. They wonder if Manny's 6-foot-2 stature was enough to intimidate the gunman. They question why Safeway hired a security guard only after the shooting.
In an emailed statement, Safeway said little except that it was working with law enforcement and that store safety is a top priority.
The night of the shooting, Huizar's co-worker said he was stocking shelves on the opposite side of the store when he heard something smashing through the glass doors, then saw someone dive into the back seat of a sedan and speed off. When he heard another employee call out, “Come save him,” he rushed to Aisle 2, then knelt on the polished floor spilled with blood and held Huizar's hand as he died.
“The best I could do was make him feel he wasn't going to go alone,” he said.
While the family waits for answers, they plan to keep returning to the sidewalk in front of Safeway, where Mexican prayer candles are burning.
“Until the day I bury him,” Jose said, “this is where I'll be.”