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Retailers push organized retail crime bill to include gift‑card fraud and online resale; lawmakers seek data and prosecutorial coordination
Summary
Retail trade groups urged the committee to pass Senate Bill 13‑21 to modernize Connecticut's statutes on organized retail crime, add gift‑card fraud to the definition and give prosecutors better tools to pursue coordinated theft rings and resale networks.
Representatives of the Connecticut Retail Network and the Connecticut Food Association told the Public Safety and Security Committee that organized retail crime (ORC) has become more sophisticated and that state law should be updated to include practices such as gift‑card tampering, online resale and trafficking of stolen goods.
Tim Phelan, president of the Connecticut Retail Network, said ORC has escalated in scale and violence and now often crosses jurisdictions and online marketplaces. "Organized retail crime is defined as a large scale theft of retail merchandise with the intent to resell stolen items for financial gain," Phelan said, and urged stronger tools for the chief state's attorney's office and the attorney general to coordinate prosecution.
Witnesses asked the committee to expand the statutory definition to capture gift‑card fraud and to clarify trafficking and resale provisions so prosecutors can aggregate related incidents into coordinated cases. "Retailers are proactively training employees to identify gift card scams and tamper gift cards and assist consumers in spotting signs of fraud or gift card tampering, but more needs to be done," Phelan said.
Wayne, testifying for the Connecticut Food Association, described multiple ORC modalities: credit‑card skimming, Eastern European gangs that operate across state lines, coordinated teams stealing higher‑value packaged items for resale online, and a regional problem tied to bottle‑deposit redemption schemes across state borders. He said organized networks are using online resale and the dark web to monetize stolen goods and urged stronger criminal penalties and enforcement authority.
Committee members asked about data and enforcement: whether current larceny and conspiracy statutes are sufficient and how retailers can best partner with law enforcement. Phelan and Wayne said retailers already collect loss‑prevention data and work with prosecutors, but they asked for updated criminal statutes and coordination resources so prosecutors can aggregate incidents and pursue ORC as organized criminal activity rather than separate petty theft cases.
Lawmakers asked the chief state's attorney's office and state police for input on prosecutorial tools; witnesses suggested the committee incorporate prosecutors' drafting suggestions as the bill advances. No committee vote was taken at the hearing.
