THIEVES TARGET UNMANNED STORES

[Anchor Lead]

There has been an increase in unmanned stores as the pandemic brought about non-contact culture. These stores don’t have any employees and customers ring up their purchases themselves. The problem is that since there is no one to mind the store, the number of thefts has spiked in these establishments. Police have caught roughly 100 thieves per month.

[Pkg]

This is an internet cafe operated without any staff. At five in the morning, when the store is empty, a man takes out a safe from under the counter. He carries the entire safe and casually walks out.

[Soundbite] (Robbed Internet Cafe Owner(VOICE MODIFIED)) : "I wondered who ransacked the place, but when I saw where the safe had been, I realized that I’d been robbed. I felt so helpless."

In less than an hour, the man took more than one million won’s worth of money and goods, including the 500,000 won in the safe. The owner says this is the second time his store has been robbed since he started the unmanned system.

[Soundbite] (Robbed Internet Cafe Owner(VOICE MODIFIED)) : "I set up unmanned systems for security and payment. They took advantage of that system to steal from me."

In April, police caught four teenagers who stole millions of won in cash from unmanned stores in the Chungcheong-do region. Last month, a man in his 20s was arrested for stealing 25 million won in cash and cars from some 30 unmanned businesses nationwide. Shoplifting incidents at unmanned stores increased from about 200 cases in 2019 to more than 300 in 2020. But this year the number has already spiked to nearly 700 as of last month. Over the three months since March, police have caught 359 people for stealing money and valuables from unmanned stores. Twenty-one of them have been taken into custody. Police said a separate locking device should be installed on safes or cash registers. They also warned that they will detain and strictly punish those who cause serious losses.