The Decreased Value of Life

A friend recently recounted an experience in the checkout line at a local bargain outlet.

“A woman walked right past me,” said my friend, “and headed out the door with a huge bundle of items in her arms. I turned to the clerk who was ringing up my purchases and asked, ‘Did she just leave without paying for those items?’”

The clerk nodded to my friend and shrugged. She explained that the store had thousands of dollars of merchandise stolen daily.

When questioned why nothing occurred to deter the thefts, the clerk explained that she was not allowed to carry a gun, and even if she did catch and stop would-be shoplifters, they were never arrested and prosecuted. So, she saw no point in pursuing the thieves if the store owners did not even care enough to follow through with the shoplifting charges.

“They can cart stuff out of here all day long for all I care; it ain’t worth dying for,” concluded the clerk.

Workers at Home Depot (HD) in Pleasanton, California, would probably agree with this bargain outlet clerk after their fellow employee was recently shot and killed in cold blood by a shoplifter.

The horrible incident started when an HD employee named Blake Mohs, a loss prevention worker, attempted to stop an apparent theft in the store at around 2 p.m. Fifteen minutes later, police were dispatched to the location for “a man bleeding inside the store.”

The two suspects fled the crime scene before police arrived but were apprehended by 2:30. The gunshot victim was transported to a nearby hospital and later died from his injuries.

Only the victim’s first name, Blake, was released immediately following the murder. But employees told reporters that he was a nice guy (26 years old) who was engaged to be married and worked with the Scouts in his spare time.

Wednesday morning, an official HD spokesman released this statement about the young victim: “We’re heartbroken over this senseless tragedy. Blake was our associate and friend, and our hearts go out to his family and everyone who knew and loved him.”

This senseless tragedy was not the first of its kind for the national home improvement chain. An 82-year-old HD employee was viciously shoved to the ground by a thief brazenly pushing a cart loaded with stolen goods from the outdoor garden center of a Hillsborough, North Carolina store. The employee died six weeks later due to complications sustained from this incident.

I am certain that this elderly worker’s coworkers and family would also advise those in the retail industry to avoid confrontations with any would-be shoplifters. Apparently, so would their bosses because the loss of merchandise through theft is already budgeted into the financial plans of most national retail corporations.

Large retailers literally have a name for this loss; it’s called shrink. The only problem with this accepted and expected theft is that retailers have created a monster, and the shrink monster is growing exponentially.

According to the 2022 National Retail Security Survey, retail shrink is now a $100 billion problem. And 80% of retailers reported that not only is shoplifting on the rise, but it is also becoming a much more organized and violent crime. In fact, 70.8% of those surveyed said that the level of violence involved in these thefts had crossed the line into felonious acts.

Over half of these retailers also claimed to be increasing their budgets to protect their employees and assets and combat organized retail crimes (ORC). They touted a wider use of technology (including AI analytics, robots, and license plate recognition), self-checkout, self-service locking cases, and a dedicated ORC team. Supposedly, these ORC teams will increase rates of apprehensions, arrests, prosecutions, and enforcement of civil fines.

It all sounds great, but it’s too little and too late for these two Home Depot employees. It’s also financially unrealistic for small business owners.

For the sake of the everyday business owner and the average retail worker, I have a few questions!

What about arming and protecting ourselves? What about our 2nd Amendment rights? Are we not promised the right as Americans to keep and bear arms? And is it not legally mandated that our right to defend ourselves shall not be infringed upon?

These questions remind me of another recent news story about a Connecticut man who successfully (and single-handedly) defended his car from being stolen in broad daylight by four brazen carjackers.

If that was not shocking enough news, an interview statement made by the police officer after the incident was even more disturbing.

“Thank God that [the car owner] wasn’t seriously hurt,” said Rocky Hill, Connecticut, Police Sgt. Jeffrey Foss-Rugan. “We’re seeing a lot of these incidents throughout the state and the country that people are intervening, and the suspect[s] may have a weapon.”

Wait … what?

When did it become standard practice (or thought) to assume bad guys can and will carry guns, but good guys should never carry one?

That sounds like some very twisted, stupid, “woke” propaganda to me.

It’s as if our country and those in charge of it have already created and passed an imaginary law making the use of guns illegal for ordinary citizens.

That is insane.

And the death of Blake Mohs is absolute, rock-solid proof of that insanity.

Because the truth is, if loss prevention specialist Blake had been trained (and allowed) to carry and use a
gun, the odds are much greater that he might still be alive.

So, please get it right, my fellow Americans.

The good guys must defend their 2nd Amendment rights to bear arms, or the bad guys will be the only ones with guns. Without the legal right to defend our families, homes, and businesses, the world will erupt into a state of constant, crime-ridden chaos.

And that is a world that none of us want to live in – or leave for our children.