> So it creates a situation where you can walk in the store, grab what you want, and then walk out with out having the police called or anyone legally allowed to stop you.

Walmart and Target, among others, reportedly monitor small thefts and let you get up to the felony threshold over multiple incidents before swooping in.

An option not available to small businesses, as the shoplifters have no doubt already learned. Another hidden tilting of the playing field against small business.

So will we see a startup: Uber for alternative policing to whom small retailers submit surveilance camera footage, and expect a series of crimes to be merged into a single case?

That’s actually a pretty compelling idea. Not necessarily the alternative policing part (private police?), but compiling hard evidence against offenders and handing that to the authorities.

Yes, exactly.

"They were robbing the store, and I think one of them had a machine gun!"

"i think they had some counterfeit $100 bills as well"

“Yes, that’s right. The shoplifted said he was going to use all the stolen merchandise as part of his unregistered securities exchange.”