Posted by FatKat on 09/16/05 14:31

In NY, we call it petty larceny, a misdemeanor punishable by up to a
year. A not too ambitious prosecutor might take the next step and
actually aggregate the above seemingly separate "transactions" in order
to charge a felony - they only need to show $1,000 - and how many CD's
does that buy? Even if you go into one store, if it's part of a chain,
and they have surveillance cameras, they can easily identify you and
spread the word to other stores in the chain.

Readers of iluvzlayur may also want to account for additional
considerations a prosecutor might weigh in favor of pressing charges -
while iluvzlayur sees what he does as a bunch of separate transactions
of an individuals, a prosecutor sees it as ongoing criminal behavior,
and part of a larger problem involving many other people doing pretty
much the same. Even when prosecuting one of iluvzlayur's "purchases"
as a misdemeanor, the DA isn't just thinking of the $15 of that one
incident - he's thinking about your other sales, and how much cash you
saved then, and everybody else with your penchant for seeking the
five-fingered discount. Prosecutors often rationalize going after
certain cases to send a message - your case would easily fall into that
category.

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