The Sun Sunnyvale's Newspaper Photograph by Skye Dunlap Leon Mendes keeps an eye out for suspicious behavior at the Town Center mall. Increased vigilance during the holidays may be the reason for a decrease in crime: 'We're just a little more cautious at this time,' Mendes says. Shoplifting arrests down this holiday, police say By Justin Berton Cops say it, local shop owners believe it, and statistics prove it: retail shoplifting plummets during the holiday season. Seems even thieves have a change of heart during the season-to-be-jolly, or, more likely, heightened awareness against theft keeps crime levels low. "Where there's a lot of people in the malls, there is a lot of holiday stress, and there is a lot of potential for crime," said Sunnyvale Capt. Chuck Eanuff. "We try to pay attention to all of that to get the numbers down." Heftier employee staffing and a heightened security presence during the holidays both tend to discourage even the most brazen of thieves, Eanuff said. Though the city's police will only step in to make an arrest after a store's security has captured a suspected shoplifter, the number of calls to make those arrests drops significantly during the month of December. Officials at Fry's Electronics in Sunnyvale, where several arrests are logged each month for shoplifting, declined to comment on any aspect of loss prevention tactics. Several large department stores, including JCPenny,--which along with Fry's has the highest arrest rate for retail crime in the city--also declined comment regarding security practices, citing unwanted exposure to another side of the retail business. A 20-month crime survey conducted by the Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety showed that arrests made at Fry's Electronics dropped off the chart for the month of December. From February 1997 through September of this year, the average number of monthly arrests was 11. In December, four arrests were made at the store. Eanuff said the drop in arrests during December reflects an overall drop in calls to police for assistance during the year. April and September are the department's busiest months, he said. Eanuff credited top-notch security details at both JCPenney and Fry's Electronics for racking up high numbers of arrests. "They've got a very active security presence at both of those locations, so they're catching them. I don't know that it is happening more, but we are certainly going out there to service their calls often." At Vallco Fashion Park in Cupertino, marketing director Mike Rohde also cited increased employee staffing during the holidays as a major deterrent of crime at the mall. "We haven't seen a rise [in reported crime] largely because stores have staffed due to the influx in crowds," Rohde said. Rohde added that at Vallco, fliers titled "Operation Cooperation" instruct shoppers in ways to ward off potential crime. Even though larger retail stores declined to comment on holiday loss prevention, smaller shop owners said they notice a dramatic difference during the holidays. "[Theft] is almost nonexistent," said Ari Afshari, owner of the Auto Barn, a model cars collectibles shop in the Town Center. Afshari said during the holiday season he tends to put more employees on the floor, increasing their presence. "More employees can keep an eye on everything. If it weren't the holidays, we might only have one person behind the counter who might not be able to see everything that is going on." Though Afshari said this holiday season seemed slower than that in past years, he said loss prevention has not been a problem. "So far, we haven't had anything stolen from us. Which is too good to be true." [ Back to Contents Page | Sunnyvale Sun Home Page | Archives ] This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, December 30, 1998. ©1998 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.