SAN FRANCISCO—The California Senate passed a controversial bill on May 31 that would prohibit employers from requiring staff to intervene in active shoplifting. The bill is pending further review by state Assembly committees.
SB 553, authored by state Sen. Dave Cortese (D-San Jose), requires employers, who could potentially be victims of shoplifting and robberies, to Prohibitdo more to “keep employees safe at work.” Employers are asked to maintain a violent incident log, provide active shooter training and shoplifter training, and stop maintaining policies that require workers to confront suspected active shoplifters. The bill allows companies to apply for workplace violence restraining orders.
Cortese said in an announcement SB 553 is intended to “help employers keep employees safe at work.” The bill passed the Senate floor with 29 ayes and 8 noes.
The California Retailers Association (CRA) says this bill, if it becomes law, will apply to all industries, not just retail.
CRA president and CEO Rachel Michelin said in an interview with Fox 2/KTVU that this bill “goes way too far.”
“I think it will open the doors even wider for people to come in and steal from our stores.”
According to the CRA, most retailers already prohibit regular employees from approaching someone who is shoplifting. These situations are handled by employees specially trained in theft prevention instead.
If employees trained in theft deterrence are not allowed to do their job per the bill, “What does that mean? We are opening up the door to allow people to walk into stores, steal, and walk out,” Michelin added.
The California Chamber of Commerce (CalChamber) refers to the bill as one that “takes a regulation written for hospitals related to workplace violence and applies it to all workplaces, regardless of size of resources.”
In a position letter addressed to senators before the floor vote on the bill, CalChamber said, “Substantively, SB 533 does not change the realities around workplace violence—namely, that it is a criminal matter that employers are not well-equipped to prevent.”
Brazen shoplifting has made a dent in retail businesses’ bottom line. Retail chain store Target expects a $1.3 billion hit due to “theft and organized crime,” according to the company’s first quarter earnings report of 2023.
Employees of a downtown San Francisco Target store told The San Francisco Standard that they experience at least 10 thefts a day.
The Target store at 1690 Folsom St initially locked up most of its merchandise to deter shoplifting, but quickly changed to only locking up more valuable goods.
As shoplifting plagues the San Francisco Bay Area, confronting thieves could be dangerous, even for trained professionals.
Whether to confront or not confront shoplifters has become a hot topic, especially after a security guard shot and killed a suspected shoplifter at a Walgreens store in downtown San Francisco.
San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins decided not to charge the guard, Michael Earl-Wayne Anthony, after reviewing the surveillance video and Anthony’s testimony.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the security guard had been directed by his employer, Kingdom Group Protective Services, to engage in “hands-on” recovery of stolen items.
It is unclear if SB 553’s policy of prohibiting employers from “forcing their workers to confront active shoplifters” would apply to security guard companies. Senator Cortese specifically referred to the Chronicle report in his statement on May 31.
Just weeks before the fatal shooting at the San Francisco Walgreens store, 26-year-old Home Depot employee Blake Mohs was shot to death trying to stop an active robbery at a store in Pleasanton.
The suspected shooter, Benicia Knapps, retrieved the stolen DeWalt box, which Mohs let go of after he got shot, surveillance video showed. Knapps left with a getaway car driven by her boyfriend David Guillory, and was later apprehended by deputies of the Alameda County Sheriff’s office after a pursuit.
The most expensive DeWalt tool box listed on the Home Depot website is $949 before discount, just under the $950 threshold required for a felony charge in California.
Constituents from Senator Cortese’s District 15 have mixed opinions on SB 553.
“There probably should be a bill,” Santa Clara resident Ty Wilson told NTD, sister media of The Epoch Times. “I think that’s probably a status quo just for safety and insurance purposes. That’s probably kind of what’s happening.”
Wilson admits this is a difficult problem to deal with. “It’s a tough situation for businesses and for the people in those situations so it’s a kind of confrontation that’s inevitable I guess.”
San Jose resident Greysi Lopez worried about the safety of his fiancé, who works as a store manager, as the situation keeps escalating.
“I think there should be some restrictions and some boundaries that should be met [to confront shoplifters],” Lopez told NTD.
“But ultimately I feel like they (shoplifters) should be apprehended because if you let them get away with this, it’s almost like letting a kid [to] keep stealing candy, not having them [be] responsible, and stores are losing, businesses are losing,” Lopez added.
NTD reporter David Lam contributed to this story.