She is great on alluring the unsophisticated—especially rich young men. She has silks and satins, laces, brocades and fine jewelry, which are sure to attract. And after she has captured one and secured the “booty” she goes out the next night with greater boldness than ever.
Another woman that more recently obtained a national reputation while in the Tombs was Miss P——. She was charged with the murder of a “book-maker” and all round sporting man. The deed was done in a cab while he was on his way to the steamer that was to take him to Europe. This woman had three trials. The first proved to be a mistrial as one of the jurors became ill and was unable to hear the rest of the testimony. After the second trial, in which the jury disagreed, Nan became a “heroine.” Friends and admirers everywhere sent her baskets of flowers, candies and frequently a hundred letters a day. Many of them, it is said, contained offers of marriage, but whether made seriously or not, no one knows. The prison authorities permitted her to receive the letters but the candies and flowers were confiscated. The third trial also proved to be a disagreement, after which she was discharged on her own recognizance. Since then she went on the stage, but did not have the same success as when she was a Florodora girl.
(3) The Modern Shoplifter
The modern shoplifter is usually a well-to-do, dressy woman of the middle class, all the way from twenty to forty years of age. She visits the large stores like a bold footpad in search of plunder. When the opportunity presents itself she steals all she can lay her hands on without being detected, then sneaks away unobserved.
Nearly all of our large dry goods and department stores offer her unusual opportunities for stealing, provided she is well dressed and knows her business. The counters of these establishments are lavish with all kinds of jewelry, laces, gloves and knick-knacks of various kinds and values. During the holidays there are dazzling arrays of silks, satins and velvets of all the colors of the rainbow from which the shoplifter can make satisfactory selections. And best of all, these stores are so thronged from morning till night, that these petty thieves are able to secrete dozens of small articles on their persons without being detected.
Shoplifters as a rule ply their business only in stores that are crowded, where they can steal unobserved and afterwards get away with the plunder. These people as a rule are bold, daring depredators who will scruple at nothing. The most dangerous of this class are so slippery that they seldom get caught, but when discovered and their rooms are searched, the police find a wagon load of stolen property, the accumulation of years of thievery.
Their work is systematic, and carefully planned, and as a rule they are able to successfully carry off the goods and get rich on them. When they go out to steal, these women have pockets in their clothing sufficiently large enough to carry away a big haul. On this account all the principal stores are compelled to employ male and female detectives to watch these thieves and arrest them in the act. Many of this class of thieves do not belong to New York. They straggle in from Long Island, Jersey and small towns on the Hudson.
The Christmas holidays are the great harvest for shoplifters and petty thieves. A gang of four expensively dressed shoplifters have been known to get away with thousands of dollars worth of furs, silk waists and laces in a season.
Scores of these women are arrested during the year who refuse to disclose their identity and many of them are sent to jail for short terms.
A shoplifter of experience was arrested not long since in a Sixth avenue department store. She was about thirty years of age and well dressed. When searched in the Tenderloin Station House, forty-one articles were found in her umbrella, ranging in value from eighteen cents to three dollars; according to the marks on the articles the shoplifter must have visited four different stores on the Avenue. Among the things found in the umbrella were belts, collars, pins, garters, laces, handkerchiefs, pocket books, pencils, combs, brushes, lockets, buttons and several bottles of cologne.