The reasons for high crime rates at Walmart stores compared to other retailers nationwide are many. Increasingly, local police departments are getting fed up with the problem—and many are accusing Walmart of not doing enough to stem the tide:
It’s not unusual for the department to send a van to transport all the criminals Ross arrests at this Walmart. The call log on the store stretches 126 pages, documenting more than 5,000 trips over the past five years. Last year police were called to the store and three other Tulsa Walmarts just under 2,000 times. By comparison, they were called to the city’s four Target stores about 300 times. Most of the calls to the northeast Supercenter were for shoplifting, but there’s no shortage of more serious crimes, including five armed robberies so far this year, a murder suspect who killed himself with a gunshot to the head in the parking lot last year, and, in 2014, a group of men who got into a parking lot shootout that killed one and seriously injured two others.
Police reports from dozens of stores suggest the number of petty crimes committed on Walmart properties nationwide this year will be in the hundreds of thousands. But people dashing out the door with merchandise is the least troubling part of Walmart’s crime problem. More than 200 violent crimes, including attempted kidnappings and multiple stabbings, shootings, and murders, have occurred at the nation’s 4,500 Walmarts this year, or about one a day, according to an analysis of media reports.
TWEET OF THE DAY
BLAST FROM THE PAST
At Daily Kos on this date in 2008—Not "Yes We Can," but rather "We Have To":
As a highly partisan Dem who has been wishing and hoping and waiting for Obama to do what we in the blogosphere have been asking for for so long from our Dem leadership--draw a sharp contrast with the Republicans and bring the fight to them--I'm a satisfied customer tonight.
Barack Obama left behind some of the more squishy "post-partisan" rhetoric and did what he had to do--define McCain as Bush's third term. "Eight is enough" might be a slightly cheesy tag line, but it works. You'll remember it and you'll say "Yeah, eight IS enough," and we can't afford Republican rule any more.
This was the speech from someone who is ready to roll up his sleeves and get in the fight. Good show.
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