MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A shopper posted on Reddit that he went inside a Kroger store about 4 p.m. earlier this week.
He returned to his car to find out that the vehicle’s window was broken with the interior destroyed, even though there was security around.
He claimed that he learned shortly after the car break in, the crooks carjacked a woman across the parking lot.
”The criminal element, they see you way before you see them, and they count on that,” said Mike Collins, a crime analyst and retired Shelby County Sheriff detective. “That is part of their element of surprise.”
Police data showed that 166 crimes were reported this year within a half-mile of the Kroger shopping center at Poplar Avenue and Kirby Parkway, including 45 on just this block.
But it’s not only isolated to this location.
FOX13 learned that more than 500 crimes were reported in a half-mile radius of the Kroger store at Poplar Avenue and Highland Street. That includes about 80 just in this part of the shopping center.
Crimes at both spots range from shoplifting and theft to robbery and assault.
Collins said that those types of crime are not uncommon for shopping centers.
”They are ideal. That’s the exact hunting grounds for criminal activity, because people are bustling, moving in and out of those particular areas,” Collins said.
Collins encourages everyone to have their guard up when running errands.
He also encourages businesses to beef up security.
”Hopefully these businesses have mobile security, so they can move around and keep the criminal off balance,” Collins said.
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