The fact is that shoplifting is an offense committed by people from all walks of life. A congress candidate has recently been accused of shoplifting over 250 items from a Target store. Allegedly, she was caught attempting to leave the store with merchandise without paying for it. She is now facing felony-level charges.

Leaving a retail store with unpaid merchandise is only one of the many acts considered shoplifting in Utah.

Let’s look at the most common ways you can shoplift in Utah:

Five Common Ways of Shoplifting in Utah

Switching Prices

Some shoplifters will “pay” for the item they’re shoplifting by ringing up at the register, but they find a way to avoid paying the full price of the item. Price switching is a common way of doing this.

As the name implies, price switching happens when the shoplifter exchanges the price tag on the shoplifted item with a less expensive one.

In practice, you didn’t “technically” steal anything, but this act is still thought of as shoplifting because of the attempt to deprive the merchant of full payment of the item’s value.

Changing Packaging

This is very similar to Price Switching. Some shoplifters will change an item’s packaging by placing a more expensive item in the packaging of a less expensive item.

Changing an item’s packaging is very risky as most stores now have security cameras and can catch you switching out the packaging. You won’t know until you’ve been watched until you approach the register.

Concealing the Item

This is by far the most common form of shoplifting, but what most people misunderstand is that a person doesn’t have to necessarily have to exist the store with unpaid merchandise for them to be detained for shoplifting.

If you’re even caught concealing any item in your personal belongings, it is considered shoplifting in Utah.

Leaving without Paying

This is when you successfully leave a store with an unpaid item. The problem with this is that it’s no longer possible since most retail items now contain a hidden electronic monitoring device. They are no longer prominent, bulky dye tubes, so, miss one and on your way out, you may trigger a detector. So, plan on being detained by store security and charged with shoplifting once the police arrive if you attempt to do this.

Employee Theft

It’s already cumbersome enough for retail stores to deal with customer shoplifting, but employees can sometimes do the same. An employee can also commit all the previous actions, and it is also considered shoplifting.

These are only the most common ways you can commit a shoplifting offense in Utah. If you are charged with shoplifting, contact our attorneys today to have someone highly qualified to represent you and, most importantly, defend you against this felony.

Petty theft

Petty theft is the criminal act of taking something that’s valued is equal to or less than a specific dollar amount, where the item’s value is less than the threshold amount. To be convicted for petty theft, the prosecutor must first convince a jury or a judge of these following reasons:

– The victim did not agree to the taking.

– The defendant intended to claim ownership of the victim’s property permanently.

– The property was taken away from the victim.

– The victim of the crime had a possessory interest in the item taken.

If charged with petty theft, the accused can be facing up to six months in county jail, a fine of up to $1,000, or both. The sentence is relative to your previous record, as repeat offenders will be handled more extremely than a first time offender.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]

Grand Theft

A general rule of thumb is if you steal property that is over $950 in value. This is a more severe offense of stealing property. The prosecution can charge it as a misdemeanor or a felony. As a felony, the accused can face up to 3 years in state prison.

Shoplifting

Shoplifting is similar to petty theft; however, it refers to store merchandise. This implies all previous requirements to convince the court if the accused is charged with shoplifting along with:

– The accused exited the store without paying for the merchandise. No matter what the intention, moving the merchandise outside the store is enough to be considered shoplifting.

– Another form of shoplifting is altering or removing price tags. This intent to take money from the merchant by attempting to pay less is also theft.

– Bringing items outside of security parameters like into a private bathroom, could also be considered shoplifting as you move products outside of the store.

Shoplifting can lead to a sentence of up to one year in jail and a relatively small fine of about $500. As stated with the previous theft charges, the sentence will depend on the misdemeanor class and the existence of prior convictions.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]