In the months after my first apprehension, there were many many more and they happened quite frequently. Some of them I made alone, while others were made with my partner who is now one of my best friends. Most of these stops were very routine with little to no real excitement. They consisted of both juveniles and adults, but most of them were relatively low dollar amount stops. In Ohio, the felony threshold is $500 and these were all below that threshold...
Until May of 2003. I was working at the store in the middle of leave-it-to-beaver-ville. Up until this point, I had only made two stops at this store and they were both juveniles stealing trading cards. Nothing to be real proud of. For about a week, my boss and I noticed that we seemed to be getting lower and lower on our stock of baby formula. After checking the purchase records, it was determined that we were missing a significant amount. So, that evening the boss and I repositioned a camera so that we had full coverage of the baby formula aisle. The very next morning, I had just arrived for my shift at about 11:00 am. I did my routine checks and headed back to the office. At this store, the office was right next to the only store entrance. As I passed by the entrance, two people caught my eye as they were entering the store; mostly because they were entering through the exit, but also because I noticed the male was digging through the garbage can. I continued on to the office and pulled them up on camera. I hadn't been able to see what they had picked out of the garbage, but I noticed that in the top of the shopping cart they were pushing, there appeared to be several empty plastic shopping bags balled up. I followed them on camera as they headed directly to the baby formula aisle. As soon as they entered, they began clearing off the shelf. They then left the formula aisle and I was forced to hit the sales floor because there was too likely a chance I would not be able to maintain surveillance with the cameras. I headed directly to the baby formula area and with my peripheral vision, I saw them directly across from the formula in the men's department. I could very clearly observe them filling the empty shopping bags with the cans of formula. I continued to watch until all the bags were filled. There was still a large number of cans that would not fit in the bags. They simply left these in the bottom of the cart and piled the full bags on top of the loose cans. Normally, I would let them leave, apprehend them, complete my paperwork, and then contact the police. This time, however, I recognized the potential danger. I knew why people stole baby formula. 99 percent of the time, baby formula theft was drug related. It would either get sold for drug money, or it would actually be used to mix into powder cocaine or heroin to expand the stash. These two definitely looked like they had a drug problem. As soon as I observed them concealing the formula, I contacted police. Several other issues factored into my decision to contact the police immediately. First, this had been the same police department I had worked for for 3 years as a corrections officer and they all knew me very well. Second, the station was directly behind the store. I stayed on the line with the dispatcher and updated her as to what was going on. The subjects pushed the shopping cart to the front of the store. Once they were at the checkout line, the male subject selected a candy bar and a bottle of pop and entered one of the express lanes. The female continued through the lanes without stopping and exited the store. I ran out in front of her and tried to stop her. She immediately became belligerent and began waving her arms wildly while she denied any wrong doing. I turned on the speakerphone option on my cell phone and put it in my pocket so I had both hands free. I grabbed hold of the female's arms and was able to get her handcuffed behind her back. Just as I had put the second cuff on, the male came walking up and tried to pretend as though he had no idea who she was or what was going on. I knew the police were either in the parking lot, or on their way so I tried to keep him in the store for as long as possible. I told him he needed to stay put, but he continued with his denials and walked past me. In one last-ditch effort to keep him the store, I attempted to grab him with my free hand but he easily avoided contact and bolted through the door. He didn't get very far. 4 police cars were waiting in the parking lot and took him into custody at gun point. An unknown getaway driver was also arrested in the parking lot. In the car the police found 4 grams of black-tar heroin, 16 used syringes, 5 packs of new syringes, 3 crack pipes, 2 small crack rocks, 2 ounces of marijuana, one small baggie of powder cocaine, an ecstasy tablet, a 9 inch homemade shank with dried blood on it, a fully loaded magazine for a Highpoint 9mm (the cheapest gun known to man)- but no gun, approximately $1200 in other various stolen merchandise, and a partridge in a pear tree.
The total tally came to 32 cans of baby formula for just under $700. Well above the felony threshold. The female pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 4 years in state prison. The male pleaded no contest and received 6 years in state prison. He also was tried and convicted for several other crimes for which he had initially failed to appear in court. He received an additional 3 years in prison for those crimes as well. The female getaway driver had a clean criminal record and received 2 years probation for complicity and conspiracy to commit theft. Over the next few months, several other area stores inspected their stocks of baby formula and almost every one of them were missing significant amounts. In every case, the stores' video clearly showed these subjects entering the store and exiting with shopping carts containing full shopping bags, however there was no video evidence of the subjects selecting or concealing the formula so local prosecutors would not allow us to file additional charges. Still, score one for the good guys.
About a year ago, I was bored at home and did a county court records search for the male half of the formula duo. Records indicate that he was released on parole after serving 4 years of his sentences. Two months after he was released, he caught an open case for murder.
The female half has also been released but has had no new records. At least not in this area.
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