THE MOTHER LODE FOR THIS TODAY'S 49ER

Pickaxe-wielding woman caught on video stealing products at LA Rite Aid 

 

By Yaron Steinbuch

 

New York Post

December 24, 2021 

The woman, slugging the pickaxe over her shoulder, helped herself to the beauty aisle as stunned customers watched her scream obscene profanities

 

Shocking video captured a woman strolling casually into a Rite Aid in Los Angeles wielding a pickaxe and stealing merchandise while spewing a stream of obscenities.

The woman, dressed all in black, was seen walking in the Venice Beach store on Lincoln Boulevard about 3 p.m. on Wednesday with the garden tool slung over her right shoulder and pulling a shopping cart behind her.

Stunned customers watched as she helped herself to beauty products before she unleashes profanities at an employee who asks her to stop.

One store clerk who engaged with the woman said, “C’mon now, put those back,” as she took products off the shelves.

“I’m not fucking around,” the unidentified woman responded. “I don’t want to smell like shit when I’m knocking these bitches out.”

Some customers laughed as the woman perused the aisles, and the store seemed bizarrely calm despite her presence. 

Storegoers stayed in the check-out line looking puzzled while she walked up to a store clerk. One mother was seen rushing her daughter out the door.

Before heading out, the woman threatened employees, saying: “Don’t say shit! Shut the fuck up! Be quiet and follow suit.”

Police told Fox 11 that no one was hurt and that they are still searching for the brazen bandit.

She left the drug store with an unknown amount of goods and has yet to be identified. 

The bizarre incident comes amid a spate of smash-and-grab robberies across California.

In November, nearly a dozen “flash-mob” raids resulted in $350 million worth of losses over a 10-day period.

Gov. Gavin Newsom recently announced that he plans to spend $300 million to crack down on the criminal rings that he said are organizing the terrifying thefts.

His spending proposal, which he plans to add to his annual budget package in January, includes $255 million to place cops in stores, $18 million to launch a new “organized theft” unit in the state Attorney General’s Office, and $20 million to help victimized small businesses.

However, as the Golden State governor vows to combat crime, LA Mayor Eric Garcetti has called for an end to a no-bail policy for some defendants, which says is needed to reduce overcrowding at jails during the pandemic, Fox News reported.

California’s violent crime increased by 0.8 percent in 2020, but property crime actually decreased by 7.7 percent, according to the state attorney general’s report released in July. The homicide rate increased by 31 percent, mirroring national trends, according to the AG. This year’s statistics have yet to be released.

Still, the state’s homicide rate is actually 11 percent lower than what it was in 2000, according to the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California.

Many have blamed the recent spate of smash-and-grabs on Proposition 47, a 2014 voter-approved state measure that decreased the penalties for lower level theft and non-violent drug crimes. Under the law, stealing goods under $950 is now classified as a misdemeanor.

Yet besides an immediate jump in property crimes of 8.15 percent in 2015 compared to 2014, property crimes in the state have actually decreased every year since 2015, according to the Sacramento Bee.