Fighting organized retail crime

Retail crimes are being taken very seriously now with two of the industry's largest and most respected organizations having tied up with the FBI to build a network that will fight retail crimes. The new organization is being called the Law Enforcement Retail Partnership Network of LERPnet and will be launching on April 9, 2007. Retailers using this database will be able to share information on organized retail crime, counterfeiting, online fraud and other crimes. This new organization has been formed as a partnership between the National Retail Federation (NRF), the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) and the FBI.

"Organized theft rings steal billions of dollars of merchandise every year, which victimizes retailers, endangers the safety of retail employees and raises the price of consumer goods," said Joseph LaRocca, vice president of loss prevention for the NRF."

LERPnet is "a vision of the retail community that will help solve a $30-billion-a-year problem," said FBI Supervisory Special Agent Brian Nadeau, program manager for the FBI's Organized Retail Theft program. "LERPnet should make it easier for the law enforcement community to track organized retail crime groups and their string of criminal conduct. This database will create a stronger partnership between retailers and law enforcement to tackle a growing problem and disrupt criminal organizations," he said.