In a small town of 7,000 people, the Wal-Mart shoplifter in my post was prosecuted. In a city, I could understand just letting the person go with a threat that they could've called the cops and had them prosecuted for hundreds of dollars. There's probably too many shoplifters to really deal with and the store doesn't feel like paying employees to sit in court for most of a day for each shoplifting case, especially when the person was lifting some low-dollar item like a candy bar.
I'll bet that the only reason they went after Winona is because she stole $6000 worth of stuff. If she was stealing candy bars, she would have walked with a stern lecture.
The best irony about shoplifting it that the person who catches the shoplifter is usually the biggest shoplifter himself.
Employee theft in retail is HUGE!!!!