The passage of the Combating Organized Retail Crime Act (CORCA) by the House last week reignited an important conversation around how we can confront the pervasive challenge law enforcement face in dealing with organized retail crime (ORC).
After almost three decades in federal law enforcement, and now leading the largest technology network in the US focused on combating retail crime, I’m often asked how we can better equip the men and women who protect our communities to keep up with the evolving tactics of ORC groups. After all, these are enormous crime networks that operate not just interstate, but transnationally.
The reality is the top 10 percent of offenders are responsible for more than 65 percent of retail crime across the country, and through retailer reporting in Auror, we know those repeat offenders are up to three times more likely to be violent or use weapons in stores. Not to mention this is commonly the highest volume crime type.
There are three key opportunities in front of us to help make law enforcement more efficient in the great work they do to keep our communities safe.
First, break down the barriers that keep law enforcement working in isolation.
Early in my career in California, crimes were treated as isolated events. That model no longer works. ORC is driven by repeat offenders across multiple retail stores and jurisdictions, making up multi-billion-dollar enterprises that fuel other crimes like gun trafficking, counterfeiting, wildlife smuggling, and human trafficking. They are not brand loyal or city specific, they ‘steal-to-order.’ What once looked like petty theft is now a sophisticated financial engine for global crime.
While leading teams at Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), we treated these groups like sophisticated criminal enterprises. By leveraging financial data with multi-agency cooperation, we changed the game on how to attack organized retail crime on a national scale. This led to us starting Operation Boiling Point, which combined law enforcement engagement with retailers at every level. In FY 2021, ORC investigations increased by more than 200 percent, and more than $9 million in assets were seized.
That’s the power of a true “coalition of the willing”. When federal agents learn from our cross-sector partners, we can outmaneuver even the most sophisticated criminal networks.
Second, embracing secure technology is the key to surfacing these networks.
The only way to see the true scale of this widespread and volumetric offending is through digital collaboration. By giving police the tools to connect with retailers on this information, they can identify the patterns, the highest harm offenders and bridge the information gap to get on top of fast-moving organized crime.
When we enable this collaboration, the outcomes are huge. Just last year, a $1 billion multi-state ORC operation based out of Texas was dismantled thanks to intelligence sharing across retailers and law enforcement
Yet in many cases, information about incidents is trapped in spreadsheets, paper files, USB sticks or WhatsApp groups. That fragmentation has allowed criminals to stay anonymous - and anonymity is how criminals thrive. Collaboration needs to be operational, daily and powered by secure technology - it is the critical enabler that can assist police deal with such a high volume problem.
Finally, our political leaders have a big role to play. The recent passing of (CORCA) by the U.S. House is welcome news. It demonstrates that retail crime is not simply about shoplifting or theft - it's violent, it's organized, it robs communities of their vibrancy, and is a city killer. This is the exact type of federal leadership needed to formalize cooperation and equip law enforcement with the tools they need to keep pace. We must maintain momentum.
By aligning federal resources under a unified strategy and strengthening prosecutorial tools—such as making ORC a predicate offense for money laundering—it enables agencies to dismantle criminal networks from the top down. It encourages the partnerships necessary to protect our economy and secure public safety.
Let’s maintain our focus on equipping our law enforcement with the tools and technology they need to efficiently target their resources on the highest harm, serious offenders in our neighborhoods.
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Raul Aguilar is Head of Law Enforcement Partnerships, Americas at Auror, and formerly HSI responsible for transnational organized crime and founder of Operation Boiling Point. Auror is a global retail crime intelligence company that provides a crime reporting platform to the world’s largest retailers to securely and consistently record crime, connect the dots on organized offenders, and collaborate with law enforcement. Auror is used in more than 85,000 stores and in 3,500 law enforcement agencies globally.
