Schenectady, New York - July 23, 2026 - Retailers across the Capital Region are seeing continued success tackling organized retail crime (ORC) thanks to a strong commitment and culture of cooperation with area law enforcement. In Schenectady, police are leading a multi-victim ORC case with a single suspect linked to 112 events across more than half a dozen retailers. The case is currently valued at roughly $16,000 with additional victims still being identified.
Recent success with ORC apprehensions have been made possible by surfacing offenders causing the most harm thanks in part to the Retail Crime Hub - an integration between retail crime intelligence software Auror and Axon’s digital evidence management system. The largest retailers across America and around the world use the Auror platform to log crime events in a consistent way after they occur in their stores. The structured reporting on the platform helps retailers connect the dots on repeat and organized offenders, and in sharing that information with police it gives them the full picture of crime across the community.
The integration with Axon digital evidence management systems, used by many police forces across the globe, allows for efficient law enforcement visibility - ensuring officers have the right information at the right time, seamlessly.
In Schenectady, the Auror network helped police connect the 112 incidents across retailers and identify an alias used by the suspect. The coordination between retailers and police on the Auror platform has established a chronological record of incidents, enabling prosecutors to demonstrate a pattern of repeated criminal behavior targeting specific retail locations.
"The hard work of local retailers, the strong relationships we've built with them, and our collaboration through Auror have helped the Schenectady Police Department save time and work more efficiently when investigating organized retail crime, both locally and across New York. Judges have also recognized the value of the detailed case packets on repeat offenders and have commented that retailers' reports are much higher quality, which helps strengthen prosecutions," said Det. Mancino of the Schenectady Police Department.
Retailer data in Auror shows the top 10 percent of retail crime offenders were responsible for 60 percent of recorded retail crime across Capital Region stores over the past year. Meanwhile, one in every nine retail crime events involve violence, weapons or threatening behavior towards retail staff, which is why it has been critical for retailers and law enforcement to focus efforts on the prolific offenders driving the most harm.
This progress in Schenectady showcases how retailers and police can come together through shared intelligence to make a meaningful impact on the safety of retail workers. Police forces nationwide are adopting centralized digital intelligence to effectively deal with the high volume nature of retail crime in order to surface high harm and organized offenders.
“The great work of Schenectady Police Department and area retailers to embrace a tech-based approach to driving down retail crime is fantastic - and it’s a blueprint for how we can fight back against this problem across the country,” Raul Aguilar, Auror’s head of law enforcement partnerships for the Americas and former Homeland Security Investigations official responsible for transnational crime, said. “Retail crime is not only violent and organized, it’s also an extremely high volume crime type, and the worst of it is driven by prolific offenders that don’t respect jurisdictional boundaries, so it’s important the sector works together to focus their resources on those causing the most amount of harm.”
Auror retailer data (Albany-Schenectady-Troy metro area):
- The top 10% of offenders are responsible for 60% of retail crime from June 2025 to June 2026.
- 1 in 9 retail crime events are violent, involve the use of weapons or threatening behavior from June 2025 to June 2026.
- Knives are the most commonly used weapon, followed by firearms and blades.
Auror retailer data (New York statewide):
- The top 10% of offenders are responsible for 65% of retail crime from June 2025 to June 2026.
- 1 in 7 retail crime events are violent, involve the use of weapons or threatening behavior from June 2025 to June 2026.
- Knives are the most commonly used weapon, followed by firearms and blades statewide.
All data has been entered by retailers using Auror. Data analysis has been controlled to account for Auror’s growth and increase in software engagement over time.
