Retail theft charges hit record high, more than tripling in four years

The number of people facing charges for retail crime has reached a record high.

Latest Ministry of Justice data shows finalised charges for theft from retail premises reached 21,185 for the year to June - more than three times as many as four years earlier.

Convictions reached 17,941 – also more than three times as many as four years earlier.

Theft-related charges made up 17% of all charges, up 5% four years earlier.

Police Retail Investigation Support Unit Manager Matt Tierney said police had been focusing strongly on retail crime in recent years, including establishing specific retail focus teams across districts, beat teams and a National Support Unit.

“It’s this work that would likely account for the increase in charges as Police work hard to hold offenders to account.”

Retail NZ Chief Executive Carolyn Young said retailers were still seeing a high level of violence, but retail crime had changed a lot since 2021, with the number of ramraids and swarm raids falling.

She said “anywhere between 10% and 30% is the reduction in retail crime that we’ve seen from stores” over the past year.

Young said retail crime was becoming less common due to the combined efforts of Police and retailers, with the focus on repeat offenders making a big difference.

“Recidivist offending is really high in retail, so you know something like 60% of the offences are carried out by 10% of the offenders.”

She said the Police National Retail Crime Unit had worked closely with retailers to apprehend these people.

“They are able to pull together a file that connects a whole range of offences that have occurred in a range of different stores, send them to a police district’s individual retail crime unit, and they can go and apprehend those people.”

Police Minister Mark Mitchell - National’s Police Spokesperson – said the increase in charges is consistent with his push for back-to basics approaching to policing.

He said the Government had invested significantly in frontline policing, equipping officers with stronger enforcement powers.

“We are also freeing up police time, for example through the national rollout of the mental health calls programme, which ensures people receive a health response, and Police have more resources to focus on core policing.”

Labour’s Police Spokesperson Ginny Anderson said police were working hard, but claimed National had wasted millions of dollars on an advisory group rehashing what she called bad ideas, like introducing citizens’ arrest powers.

“What retailers really need are the 500 extra police Christopher Luxon promised and has failed to deliver.”