Two Minnesota women have been charged with organized theft after instructing another woman to steal more than $5,000 worth of merchandise from a Lululemon store in Minneapolis, according to a report.
Lululemon investigators noticed high theft losses at their downtown store and identified a suspect after speaking with store employees and watching back surveillance footage, according to court filings.
The suspect – who has not been charged – would take bags from the store, fill them with other stolen merchandise and then leave without paying.
Investigators placed GPS trackers in several bags throughout the store and were able to track the suspect, according to the complaint.
The woman would bring the stolen goods to Diamond Nails Salon in nearby Crystal, Minn., then walk out of the salon without the bags and with a “large sum of money in her hand,” the complaint said.
When police arrested the suspect, she said a woman who worked at the salon – who she called Van – had told her to steal the clothing.
The suspect said Van would pay her $400 for the stolen clothes.
Van would then remove the security tags and resell the stolen goods, she said.
The suspect said she had made at least 100 transactions with Van.
At one point, a tracker showed the stolen goods stayed in the salon for several hours before they were moved near the roommates’ home, the complaint said.
Police officers said they saw Van leave the nail salon carrying large plastic garbage bags.
Minneapolis police officers tracked down the two women – 56-year-old My Hoang Thi Van and 24-year-old Kathy Nguyen, who lived together, according to The Minnesota Star Tribune.
Around the time the shoplifter was arrested, police officers who were surveilling the roommates’ home saw two women and a man “quickly removing numerous white plastic bags of merchandise from the residence,” the complaint said.
Police officers found “numerous white plastic bags of stolen Lululemon merchandise” and security tags in the defendants’ home, the complaint said.
The total value of the stolen clothing is still unclear, but the complaint said the stolen merchandise was worth more than $5,000.
