Loose inventory was stacked in a pile as shop owner Shara Ertel unpacked products last month inside of her grocery store, Fulfilled Goods, in Newton Centre. A customer lingered nearby, hands slipping in and out of their pockets while slinking around beside the merchandise, Ertel recalled.

Ertel and one of her employees kept busy, pretending to restock while surveilling warily from a few feet away. They had noticed similar behavior from another patron weeks earlier. 

“My employee thought she saw something go in his pocket but wasn’t 100% sure,” Ertel said.

Fulfilled Goods is one of scores of Newton retailers victimized by shoplifters over the past three years. Shoplifting arrests by Newton police rose from 11 in 2023 to 22 in 2024, then fell back to 12 last year, according to publicly available data.

Police are also making arrests for larceny and organized retail theft, when groups of thieves coordinate to steal merchandise, said Newton Police Lt. Amanda E. Henrickson, commander of the Community Services Bureau. The city’s range of retail options, from the high-end Shops at Chestnut Hill to Marshalls and T.J. Maxx and others on Needham Street, attracts “bad actors,” she said.

“It’s not just a single person. You end up with three or four arrests for one incident,” Hendrickson said. “Somebody is going in, someone’s maybe a lookout, someone might be a deterrent, and someone else might actually be committing a theft.” 

In April 2024, Newton police arrested three people for a suspected theft at the Nike store on Boylston Street, according to Henrickson and court records. A spokesperson for Nike did not respond to a reporter’s calls. 

In December, four people were arrested for trying to steal from athletic apparel store Lululemon at The Shops at Chestnut Hill, court records show. A spokesperson for Lululemon Athletica did not respond to requests for comment. 

“They try to split the attention of people trying to prevent the thefts,” Hendrickson said.

Statewide, shoplifting arrests made by Massachusetts law enforcement agencies rose more than 73% between 2023 and 2025, according to data police must submit monthly to the state Executive Office of Public Safety and Security.

A person can be prosecuted for a misdemeanor shoplifting charge if they steal merchandise from a retailer with a value of $250 or less, but punishment can increase with subsequent thefts. Shoplifters can be prosecuted for felony larceny if they steal $1,200 or more of goods from a retailer, though prosecutors cannot aggregate multiple thefts to reach that threshold. A misdemeanor larceny charge is a non-retail theft of $1,200 or less.

The Legislature enacted an organized retail theft statute in 2015, amid growing concern about the crime in Massachusetts.

“People are struggling,” Ertel said. “People are having a hard time finding jobs. People are losing jobs. I’d be surprised if [shoplifting] wasn’t on the rise.”

But the crimes are harming retailers, who reluctantly alter their customers’ shopping experience, said Ryan C. Kearney, general counsel for the Massachusetts Retailers Association, a 4,000-member trade organization.

Merchants have had to lock up everything from shampoo to milk to baby diapers, manage nervous employees who have to testify against accused shoplifters, install cameras and other technology to keep their businesses secure, and assist police investigating incidents. Retailers lose $1.2 billion in revenue annually due to stolen merchandise and the state forfeits $78 million in lost sales tax, Kearney said.

Stores shut down if shoplifting costs them too much or makes their employees feel less safe, Kearney said.

“If someone comes in and steals something from your place of business, you do not feel safe,” Kearney said. “People can criticize the retail industry for worrying about their profitability, but our biggest asset is our workforce and our consumer base. And if they’re not safe, we have a huge problem.”

At least a dozen Newton residents were among those arrested here on shoplifting charges in those three years, but the suspects come from communities across the state as well as Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey and California. 

Retailers struggle to balance a welcoming environment for shoppers with security measures to deter theft, Henrickson said. 

“Our retailers want to make their stores inviting. They don’t want their items to have security tags everywhere,” Henrickson said. “We don’t want it to seem like [people] are in like, some type of mausoleum. That’s always a challenge.”

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This story was produced in Boston University Professor Maggie Mulvihill’s Data Journalism course as part of a partnership between the Newton Beacon and the BU Department of Journalism’s Newsroom program.