Winnipeg police made two separate arrests with the suspects not connected to each other, but both detained on Liquor Mart theft charges across the city.
Tuesday evening, approximately 10:30 p.m. officers arrested a 16-year-old girl in the Sargent Park area. Over three months she stole $4 thousand worth of liquor.
Another arrest was made the same day, a 28-year-old woman is suspected of stealing a little over $5 thousand worth of alcohol form Winnipeg Liquor Marts.
There is a huge amount of thefts in liquor marts nearly 1300 reported this year, which a big increase in comparison to previous years and there are still four-month left in 2018. This statistics is at least concerning, but also show a bigger problem in the city where crime lever constantly rises and police are not capable of preventing it from increasing every year.
Winnipeg police said that security staff of these stores is not doing their job, not doing enough to prevent thefts like this from happening in their stores, but also often employees do not even try to intervene or confront thieves when such crimes occur. As police said, criminals just walk into the store, take the liquor then simply walk away and the guards do not try to stop them. Wednesday Manitoba Liquor and Lotteries had a statement go public, where they claim such incidents are getting out of hand and dangerous for employees and other store customers when criminal are being confronted. At some point, simple robbery can turn into a life-threatening situation if guards are involved, so in many cases, people just chose to do not intervene, to stay safe and alive.
Unfortunately, it happens so often, that some people just take a habit of liquor stealing. Just last week Winnipeg Police arrested a young woman, now she is in custody and faces at least 19 Liquor Mart theft charges in addition to several clothing store thefts.