The only link between organized retail crime and any other illicit activity is money. If a group is into organized retail crime, chances are they are into other illegal money making schemes, as well. That doesn’t mean the different activities are somehow intrinsically linked together.
Some do, some don’t, depending on the group and the location. Most would just drift to whatever gets them easy money.
“Organized” doesn’t even have to be that large, could be a small group of accomplices that then know another group who is fencing stolen stuff.
If jumping into a Target or Walmart with a large garbage bag filling it with stuff to sell later makes a few extra bucks, why not? The police and the store employees just sit there looking at you without any real consequences. So why not do it?
I don't think crime groups are that significant in urban crime or black markets. There are networks of the more absolutely free market, enabled by every legal restriction, and products reuse these networks in different paths to the profit of different participants.
You are correct. The parent’s home plus some assets of two other individuals probably totaling a max of $5 million but nowhere close to $250 million - which was a stupid amount to set in the first place. Either require a reasonable bond amount or deny bail.
Idk, this article seems hopelessly naive. So, the author would essentially like to go back in time to a less morally ambiguous internet when people (i.e. techies and nerds) had engaging, thoughtful, and respectful conversations where each emerged a better person. Not gonna happen. The future of social networking looks a lot more like Twitter (but meaner) than it does to the halcyon days of IRC.
