BLACK-MARKET BUSINESS BOOMING IN CITY

Working a security detail at the South Side Giant Eagle on a summer
night, Jeff Watt found himself struggling with a man suspected of
trying to steal $419 worth of meat.

"He elbowed me in the face three times," said Watt, a Pittsburgh
police officer.

Store surveillance footage shows the man wheeling a shopping cart
full of steaks and chops out the store's front door, until Watt and a
manager escort him back inside. Authorities say the loot likely was
headed to one of the city's illicit markets, where thieves offer
merchandise from plastics bags, trucks and the trunks of cars.

Forget department stores, discount stores or other retail outlets. In
Pittsburgh, as in many other cities, consumers can buy goods on the
street for pennies on the dollar, police and retail merchants say.
You just need to know where to look.

In addition to steaks, thieves here sell batteries, hair gel, body
wash, razors, expensive suits, even plasma TVs and DVDs -- stolen
from Giant Eagle, Rite-Aid, Target, Kaufmann's, Family Dollar and
other stores. They offer their wares in bars, restaurants and
vehicles parked in the Hill District, Strip District, Lawrenceville
and East Liberty.

Christie Kaelin, co-owner of Jerry's 1888 tavern on the North Side,
became so fed up with men barging into the bar with boxes of meat,
gold chains and toys that she adopted a zero-tolerance policy toward
the merchants.

"They poke their head in the door and yell, 'Anybody need any
cigarettes?' " she said. "One guy came in with a trash bag full of
tennis shoes. You wonder where they get the stuff."

Web designer Tom Bourke, of Penn Hills, bought a four-pack of
underwear from a man he knows only as "Mr. Black Market" inside a
Penn Hills bar one recent evening. The seller came in with shopping
bags full of boxer shorts and laid out his wares on the bar's pool
table, Bourke said.

"I told Mr. Black Market that I'm a briefs guy, and he asked me what
my size was," Bourke said. "He told me he'd come back in a few days,
and he did. I came into the bar a day later and the bartender says to
me, 'Hey, I got your underwear.' "

Ted Johnson, of Beltzhoover, bought a large bottle of body wash for
$5 as he sat inside a North Side bar. It cost less than half what
he'd pay at CVS, he said.

"It's convenient. That's why people buy the stuff," Johnson said.

Pittsburgh police reported 919 retail theft cases in 2004, slightly
down from the previous year's 929. So far this year, there have been
616 theft reports. The highest number of incidences took place
Downtown, in the Strip District, Polish Hill and Lawrenceville.

Employees at The Family Dollar store on Brighton Road, North Side,
say shoplifters there cause losses averaging $3,500 a week, even
though the store is located across the street from the Zone 1 police
station. Much of the loot, primarily health and beauty aids, ends up
for sale on the streets and at local flea markets, said an employee
who declined to be identified.

The scope of the trade amazes Watt and other authorities who track it.

"For some reason, there's tons of meat for sale on the streets. It's
always been like that in Pittsburgh," said Watt, who says he's caught
400 shoplifters in 12 years working security details. "I was shocked
when I discovered the open-air meat market in the Hill. I couldn't
believe it was as active as it is."

The dealers constantly move locations and try new tactics to avoid
police detection, he said.

John Merrill, the accused meat thief who tussled with Watt, once
lived in McKees Rocks and told police he came back to visit after
living in Florida. Merrill has arrest records in several states, Watt
said. He remains in the Allegheny County Jail, awaiting trial on
charges of aggravated assault on a police officer with injury,
escape, retail theft, making terroristic threats, and resisting arrest.

Fencing stolen goods can be a sophisticated operation, said Richard
Hollinger, a criminologist at Florida State University who has
written extensively about retail theft.

"The thieves start out their day by going out 'shopping' -- stealing
the steaks, the Motrin, the batteries, items that can be easily
fenced. It is then taken to a middleman, who takes it to the street
where it is sold," Hollinger said.

In 2004, U.S. retailers lost an estimated $33 billion of their $1.3
trillion business to employee thefts and shoplifting, Hollinger said.

As in many cities across the country, Pittsburgh's flourishing black
market in stolen goods is driven by bands of thieves hooked on crack
cocaine and heroin, authorities say.

"Most of those involved in retail theft are drug addicts looking for
a fix," said Daniel Fitzsimmons, chief trial deputy with the
Allegheny County District Attorney's office. "Some of these repeat
offenders are incorrigible."

Retailers say thieves find stealing to be worth the risk because
they're often cited with misdemeanors, and many offenders receive
written warnings if the goods are worth less than $150.

Police focus on violent crimes, not people caught with a steak tucked
into a waistband, said King Rogers, a former vice president for
Target International, the corporate parent of Target and Marshall
Fields department stores.

"Stealing is a lot more lucrative and less risky for boosters, as
opposed to drugs and robbery," said Rogers, who runs KingRogers
International, a security consulting firm in Cook, Minn.

"Law enforcement are not as educated on the scope, magnitude and cost
of the issue," he said. "Boosters usually get a slap on the wrist and
no jail time, and are usually back on the street the next day."

One repeat offender well known to Pittsburgh police is Robert
Hartwell, of Sheraden, who was sentenced Sept. 15 to 11 to 23 months
in prison for each of five counts, after pleading guilty to a retail
theft spree that began last year.

Hartwell's heists included a $3,500 fur coat from Carl W. Herrmann
Furs, Downtown; $2,100 worth of suits from Jos. A. Banks, Downtown; a
$3,000 plasma TV from a Sears store; and assorted jewelry.

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Kathleen Durkin last week granted
Hartwell permission to serve his sentence in the Renewal Center
halfway house, Downtown. He still faces probation hearings before
three more judges this year.

Furrier Guy Herrmann said judges need to lock up offenders for long periods.

"It's a travesty the legal system hasn't been able to stop these
career criminals," said Herrmann, whose 105-year-old family store has
recorded only one theft -- Hartwell's -- in the past 12 years. "The
judges need to give (thieves) jail time and make them sit. If not,
where's the deterrent?"

Hollinger, the Florida State criminologist, says retail theft affects
everyone in the end, by resulting in higher prices for consumers.

"Shoplifting feeds drug abuse, which feeds the violence on the
streets. And the icing on the cake is that we're all paying for it,"
Hollinger said.