On a Tuesday afternoon I was working on some paper work in my office when I received a phone call from reception inquiring about a lost and found item. A woman named Kathy had just finished eating in the food court and was now missing her wallet, she believed that she had left it on the counter at the restaurant or in the washroom and was wondering if it had been turned in. I told reception that we hadn't received anything but to take her information and we would call her if it was handed over to us. The whole interaction was very routine and I entered the information into our lost and found matrix. I was ready to leave it at that and go about my day, but we had reports of several people missing their wallets over the last couple weeks and I was starting to get a feeling that there was something bigger going on.

A bit later in the day when I had some time, I pulled up my cameras to track the movements of the complainant. I do this fairly regularly for issues such as thefts, loss of balance complaints, or disagreements between parties but I had to start by figuring out what she looked like since I never actually interacted with her. I have gotten quite good at looking people up on social media to get a profile for them and then identifying them on camera but in this case, it was easy because I knew where she was at the time that she complained to reception and just reviewed footage in reverse from when she inquired about lost and found to where she was sitting in the food court. It was fairly easy to find her as she sat down with some co-workers at a table in the middle of the food court to enjoy her lunch.

The first thing I looked at was when she paid for the food since I assumed that was the last time she had used her wallet. The interaction appeared normal and after she paid for the food she put her wallet back into her purse so I knew it wasn't left on the counter. I also wanted to check her movement to and from the washroom but found that she didn't use the washroom between when she purchased her food and when she inquired about the lost wallet.

I went back to when she purchased the food and put her wallet back into her purse. She took the food on a standard plastic food court tray to her table with her co-workers who purchased food from a different restaurant and they sat down at a table with 4 chairs in the middle of the food court. Sections of the food court are divided by booths with several tables in the middle which all have moveable chairs. They alternate between two and four seaters and in the midafternoon are usually very busy.

I noticed that she put her purse over the corner of her chair hanging down behind her which I constantly try to educate everyone I come in contact with not to do since it promotes theft but, I didn't really see any issues and wasn't really sure what to think at that point. I checked the people around her and some people changed seats but seemed to be keeping to themselves. I watched it a couple times but didn't really see anything different.

One thing that I have found helpful over the years is watching the same CCTV footage several times at various speeds because I find it easier to spot patterns or things that stand out at different speeds. It took about three watches at 16x but eventually I saw it and then couldn't unsee it, and wondered how I could have missed it.

At 16x it was obvious to see a male walk up and down the rows of tables starting from about 10 rows beyond her. He walked up and down the isles at a pace that was benign and undetectable at regular speed however it stood out at 16x as he zoomed back and forth and zig zagged his way through the tables. He then walked behind her and stood in line for food at the same restaurant that she had ordered from about 20 feet away but was looking in her direction the entire time. A minute later just before his turn to order he left the line and leaned against a nearby waste station where the food trays are discarded for cleaning. He pulled out his cell phone, made a call, and motioned at someone in the distance. This part also stood out at 16x because for a while he was the only person standing up and not moving while he waited a few minutes at the waste station.

When the couple behind Kathy's table stood up from their seats the male then grabbed an empty food tray and sat down at their table and was located back-to-back with Kathy. A few seconds later 2 other males sat down at the table with him. The males were all black, tall, thin, wearing all black with baseball hats with the logo of the local sports team. I observed them sit at the table for a bit and not talk to each other, each was seemingly looking in a different direction while the first male took off his jacket and hung it over back of his chair which was directly back-to-back with Kathy's. They all stood up at the same time about 2 minutes later and left leaving the empty plastic tray there. The male who had hung his jacket over the back of the chair picked it up in a peculiar manor as he appeared to be concealing something under it as he left the food court. After another watch I could see him reaching back under the jacket to get at the purse with his left arm while looking forward the entire time.

I finished by locating where they came from and went too which was easy because it was the same place. They had parked a vehicle on the street in front of the next building over and followed the same route to and from the vehicle. The vehicle was parked far away from the camera and I wasn't able to even get a make and model never mind a license plate, I could tell it was dark blue. There was a fourth person waiting in the driver seat of the vehicle for a speedy get away, I wasn't able to see what he looked like.

I was impressed by the level of organization shown by them but also concerned that they were really cleaning up in the food court. I watched them carefully as they made their way through the property and looked all through the food court to select their victims but the strange thing is that Kathy's wallet was the only one that they took. It was odd to say the least that these 4 guys were this skilled and displaying this level of sophistication but stopped at only one wallet. I'm not rooting for them but I think I would have taken more especially since I don't suspect that the average security guard would have looked this hard into her lost and found wallet, I'm just a keener.

The next step was to see how wide spread of an issue this was. There were two lost and found wallet inquiries within the last 2 weeks which is the length of time that our CCTV servers save video for, so I went back to see if these guys were operating on those days. It turned out that Mondays and Wednesdays were their scheduled days of operation and they had been in the last two weeks on those days between 1100 and 1300. They parker in the same place, they wore similar outfits, they were all present for those days, and strangely they again only hit one victim. Although I didn't know what the victims looked like, it seemed as though the times lined up for those previous lost wallet inquiries.

After I saved the footage, I made the necessary phone calls to the owners of the lost wallets to verify what I had seen on CCTV and share my findings. I walked them through filing a police report and encouraged them to email me the general occurrence number so that I could provide the footage directly to the police as we don't provide any footage to victims. They were all extremely grateful for my call and one of the victims from the week prior said that there were unauthorized purchases made with his credit card before he could cancel it, he said that he should be able to avoid the charges.

I put out a BOLO on the suspects and briefed the teams about the recent activity in the food courts but then rotated into nights and lost touch. I know that they were onsite for the Monday and Wednesday of the next week but after being followed around by our security team they switched it to only Tuesday the week after. When I switched back to days, I had my manager on standby in his suit and tie to go get their license plate number if they parked in their usual spot but they never showed up again. Truthfully, I am not sure what happened to these guys. I don't know if we managed to spook them and they were concerned that they would be busted if they returned or if they got caught and arrested elsewhere, either way I never saw them again.

What did I learn – Trust your instincts, if something doesn't seem right it probably isn't. Always look at the same situation in different ways, maybe this means different camera angles or at different speeds. Never hang your jacket or purse over the back of your chair in a crowded food court. Finally, people are creatures of habit and will generally do the same things over and over again at the same time in the same way, it makes them easier to catch.