Pickpocketing is a form of larceny that involves the stealing of money or other valuables from the person or a victim's pocket without them noticing the theft at the time. It may involve considerable dexterity and a knack for misdirection. A thief who works in this manner is known as a pickpocket.
Pickpockets and other thieves, especially those working in teams, sometimes apply distraction, such as asking a question or bumping into the victim. These distractions sometimes require sleight of hand, speed, misdirection and other types of skills. [1] [2]
Pickpockets may be found in any crowded place around the world. However, Barcelona and Rome have been noted as being particularly dangerous pickpocket havens. [3] [4] Thieves have been known to operate in high traffic areas such as mass transit stations, even boarding subway trains so they can use the distractions of crowds and sudden stop-and-go movements from the train to steal from others. As soon as the thieves have what they want, they simply get off at the next stop leaving the victim unable to figure out who robbed them and when.
Pickpocketing skills are employed by some magicians as a form of entertainment, either by taking an item from a spectator or by returning it without them knowing they had lost it. Borra , arguably the most famous stage pickpocket of all time, became the highest-paid European performer in circuses during the 1950s. For 60 years he was billed as "the King of Pickpockets" and encouraged his son, Charly, to follow in his cunning trade, his offspring being billed as "the Prince of Pickpockets". [5] Henri Kassagi, a French-Tunisian illusionist, acted as technical advisor on Robert Bresson's 1959 film Pickpocket and appeared as instructor and accomplice to the main character. British entertainer James Freedman created the pickpocket sequences for the 2005 film Oliver Twist directed by Roman Polanski. [6] American illusionist David Avadon featured pickpocketing as his trademark act for more than 30 years and promoted himself as "a daring pickpocket with dashing finesse" and "the country's premier exhibition pickpocket, one of the few masters in the world of this underground art." [7] [8] According to Thomas Blacke, an American illusionist who holds several world records, it has become more difficult nowadays to pickpocket both in the streets and on the stage because the general population wears less, or lighter, clothing. [9] In 2015 an artist hired a pickpocket to distribute sculptures at Frieze Art Fair in New York. [10]
Pickpocketing often requires different levels of skill, relying on a mixture of sleight of hand and misdirection. To get the proper misdirect or distraction, pickpockets will normally use the distracting environment that crowds offer or create situations using accomplices. Pickpocketing still thrives in Europe and other countries that are high in tourism. It's most common in areas with large crowds. Sometimes pickpockets put signs up that warn tourist to watch for pickpockets. This causes people to worry and quickly check if their valuables are still on them, thereby showing pickpockets exactly where their valuables are. Once a pickpocket finds a person they want to steal from, often called a "mark" or a victim, the pickpocket will then create or look for an opportunity to steal. [11]
The most common methods used by modern-day pickpockets are:
Famous fictional pickpockets include the Artful Dodger and Fagin, characters from the Charles Dickens' 1838 novel Oliver Twist . Famous true-life historical pickpockets include the Irish prostitute Chicago May, who was profiled in books; Mary Frith, nicknamed Moll Cutpurse; the Gubbins band of highwaymen; and Cutting Ball, a notorious Elizabethan thief. George Barrington's escapades, arrests, and trials, were widely chronicled in the late 18th-century London press.
The 17th and 18th centuries saw a significant number of men and women pickpockets, operating in public and/or private places and stealing different types of items. Some of those pickpockets were caught and prosecuted for their theft, however, in most cases, they managed to avoid punishment (whether they were skilful enough not to get caught or they were acquitted in court).
In the 17th century, pickpockets were sometimes referred to as "cut-purses", as can be seen in some 17th century ballads. [13] At that time, pockets were not yet sewn to clothes, as they are today. This means that the pockets were a small purse that people wore close to their body. This was especially true for women, since men's pockets were sewn "into the linings of their coats". [14] Women's pockets were worn beneath a piece of clothing, and not "as opposed to pouches or bags hanging outside their clothes". [15] These external pockets were still in fashion until the mid-19th century. [15]
Pickpocketing in the 18th century was committed by both men and women (looking at prosecuted cases of pickpocketing, it appears that there were more female defendants than male.) [16] Along with shoplifting, pickpocketing was the only type of crime committed by more women than men. [17] It seems that in the 18th century, most pickpockets stole out of economic needs: they were often poor and did not have any economic support, [18] and unemployment was "the single most important cause of poverty", [19] leading the most needy ones to pick pockets.
In most cases, pickpockets operated depending on the opportunities they got: if they saw someone wearing a silver watch or with a handkerchief bulging out of their pocket, the pickpockets took the item. This means that the theft was, in such cases, not premeditated. However, some pickpockets did work as a gang, in which cases they planned thefts, even though they could not be sure of what they would get (Defoe's Moll Flanders [20] gives several examples of how pickpockets worked as a team or on their own, when the eponymous character becomes a thief out of need).
The prosecutions against pickpockets at the Old Bailey between 1780 and 1808 show that male pickpockets were somewhat younger than female ones: 72% of men pickpockets convicted at the time were aged from under 20 to 30, while 72% of women convicted of picking pockets were aged between 20 and 40. [16] One reason that may explain why women pickpockets were older is that most of women pickpockets were prostitutes (this explains why very few women under 20 years old were convicted for picking pockets). At the end of the 18th century, 76% of women defendants were prostitutes, and as a result, the victims of pickpockets were more often men than women. [16]
In most cases, these prostitutes would lay with men (who were frequently drunk), and take advantage of the situation to steal from these clients. Men who were robbed by prostitutes often chose not to prosecute the pickpockets, since they would have had to acknowledge their "immoral behaviour". [19] The few men who decided to prosecute prostitutes for picking their pockets were often mocked in Court, and very few prostitutes ended up being declared fully guilty. [16]
The men who were prosecuted for picking pockets and who were under 20 years old were often children working in gangs, under the authority of an adult who trained them to steal. [19] The children involved in these gangs were orphans (either because of having been abandoned or because their parents had died), and the whole relationship they had with the adult ruling the gang and the other children was that of a "surrogate family". [19] Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist provides a good example of how orphans were recruited and turned into street criminals.
Male and female pickpockets tended to operate in different locations: 80% of men operated in public areas while 78% of women operated in private places. [16] This can be explained by the fact that most female pickpockets were prostitutes, robbing their victims in their lodging after having lain with them. Male pickpockets, on the other hand, tended to operate in public places because they did not have the opportunity that prostitutes had.
The fact that men and women did not operate in the same places led to them stealing different types of items: men stole mostly handkerchiefs, [16] because they were one of the easiest items to take from someone without them noticing it. Women tended to steal watches (some pickpockets also stole watches in public places, but it was more difficult) and bags with money in them. When defending themselves in court, prostitutes often argued that the money had been a gift from the victim and managed to be acquitted, as the men prosecuting them were often drunk at the time of the theft and were not taken seriously by the court. [18]
In the eyes of British law, pickpocketing was considered a capital offence from 1565 on: [16] this meant that it was punishable by hanging. [19] However, for the crime to be considered as a capital offence, the stolen item had to be worth more than 12 pennies, otherwise it was considered to be petty larceny, [16] which meant that the thief would not be hanged. The 18th century law also stated that only the thief could be prosecuted—any accomplice or receiver of the stolen item could not be found guilty of the crime: "This meant that, if two people were indicted together, and there was not clear proof as to which one made the final act of taking, neither should be found guilty". [16] : 69
Moreover, in order to be able to prosecute someone for pickpocketing, the victim of the theft had to not be aware that they were being robbed. In 1782, a case at the Old Bailey made it clear that this was supposed to prevent people who had been robbed while they were drunk from prosecuting the defendant (in most of the cases that meant men who had been robbed by prostitutes): [16] The victims of pickpockets who were drunk at the time of the theft were considered to be partially responsible for being robbed.
Even though pickpockets were supposed to be hanged for their crime, this punishment, in fact, rarely happened: 61% of women accused of picking pockets were acquitted [19] and those who were not acquitted often managed to escape the capital sentence, as only 6% of defendants accused of pickpocketing between 1780 and 1808 were hanged. [16]
In the cases of prostitutes being accused of having pickpocketed male prosecutors, the jury's verdict was very often more favourable to the woman defendant than to the man prosecuting her. [16] Men who had been laying with prostitutes were frowned upon by the court. One of the reasons was that they had chosen to take off their clothes, they were also drunk most of the time, so they were considered responsible for being robbed. The other reason is that it was considered bad for a man to mix with a prostitute, which is why in many cases there was no prosecution: the victim was too ashamed of admitting that he had been with a prostitute. [16]
In those cases, since the jury was often inclined to despise the prosecutor and to side with the defendant, when they did not completely acquit the woman they often reached a partial verdict and this mostly meant transportation [16] to America (that is the case for Moll Flanders [20] ), and to Australia later on.
Theft is the act of taking another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it. The word theft is also used as a synonym or informal shorthand term for some crimes against property, such as larceny, robbery, embezzlement, extortion, blackmail, or receiving stolen property. In some jurisdictions, theft is considered to be synonymous with larceny, while in others, theft is defined more narrowly. A person who engages in theft is known as a thief.
Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take anything of value by force, threat of force, or by use of fear. According to common law, robbery is defined as taking the property of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the person of that property, by means of force or fear; that is, it is a larceny or theft accomplished by an assault. Precise definitions of the offence may vary between jurisdictions. Robbery is differentiated from other forms of theft by its inherently violent nature ; whereas many lesser forms of theft are punished as misdemeanors, robbery is always a felony in jurisdictions that distinguish between the two. Under English law, most forms of theft are triable either way, whereas robbery is triable only on indictment. The word "rob" came via French from Late Latin words of Germanic origin, from Common Germanic raub "theft".
Larceny is a crime involving the unlawful taking or theft of the personal property of another person or business. It was an offence under the common law of England and became an offence in jurisdictions which incorporated the common law of England into their own law, where in many cases it remains in force.
Shoplifting, shop theft, retail theft, or retail fraud is the theft of goods from a retail establishment during business hours, typically by concealing a store item on one's person, in pockets, under clothes or in a bag, and leaving the store without paying. With clothing, shoplifters may put on items from the store and leave the store wearing the clothes. The terms shoplifting and shoplifter are not usually defined in law. The crime of shoplifting generally falls under the legal classification of larceny. Shoplifting is distinct from burglary, robbery, or armed robbery. In the retail industry, the word shrinkage can be used to refer to merchandise lost by shoplifting, but the word also includes loss by other means, such as waste, uninsured damage to products and theft by store employees.
Distraction is the process of diverting the attention of an individual or group from a desired area of focus and thereby blocking or diminishing the reception of desired information. Distraction is caused by: the lack of ability to pay attention; lack of interest in the object of attention; or the great intensity, novelty or attractiveness of something other than the object of attention. Distractions come from both external sources, and internal sources. External distractions include factors such as visual triggers, social interactions, music, text messages, and phone calls. There are also internal distractions such as hunger, fatigue, illness, worrying, and daydreaming. Both external and internal distractions contribute to the interference of focus.
Jonathan Wild, also spelled Wilde, was a London underworld figure notable for operating on both sides of the law, posing as a public-spirited vigilante entitled the "Thief-Taker General". He simultaneously ran a significant criminal empire, and used his crimefighting role to remove rivals and launder the proceeds of his own crimes.
A fence, also known as a receiver, mover, or moving man, is an individual who knowingly buys stolen goods in order to later resell them for profit. The fence acts as a middleman between thieves and the eventual buyers of stolen goods who may not be aware that the goods are stolen.
Charles Hitchen, also mentioned as Charles Hitchin in other sources, was a "thief-taker" and under-marshal of the City of London in the early 18th century, also, famously tried for homosexual acts and sodomy offences. Alongside his former assistant and then a major rival Jonathan Wild, against whom he later published a pamphlet and contributed to his sentencing to death, Hitchen blackmailed and bribed people and establishments irrespective of their reputation, suspicious or respectable. Despite the disgrace of the people he earned through his abusive exercising of his power, he remained in power and continued fighting against violent crime, especially after the ending of the war of the Spanish Succession and until 1727.
Possession of stolen goods is a crime in which an individual has bought, been given, or acquired stolen goods.
Harry in Your Pocket is a 1973 comedy-drama film, about a team of professional pickpockets written by James Buchanan and Ronald Austin and directed by Bruce Geller, starring James Coburn, Michael Sarrazin, Trish Van Devere and Walter Pidgeon. Prior to release, the film was titled Harry Never Holds.
In English legal history, a thief-taker was a private individual hired to capture criminals. The widespread establishment of professional police in England did not occur until the 19th century. With the rising crime rate and newspapers to bring this to the attention of the public, thief-takers arose to partially fill the void in bringing criminals to justice. These were private individuals much like bounty hunters. However, thief-takers were usually hired by crime victims, while bounty hunters were paid by bail bondsmen to catch fugitives who skipped their court appearances and hence forfeited their bail. Both types also collected bounties offered by the authorities.
David Avadon, formerly "David Hutchins," was an American illusionist who billed himself as the country's "premier exhibition pickpocket." He lectured and wrote a book on pickpocketing and performed his trademark theatrical pickpocketing act for more than 30 years.
Apollo Robbins is an American sleight-of-hand artist, security consultant, self-described gentleman thief and deception specialist. Forbes has called him "an artful manipulator of awareness".
Crime in Cambodia is present in various forms.
This article discusses crime in Suriname.
Deborah Churchill (1677–1708) was a British pickpocket and prostitute executed for being an accomplice to murder in 1708.
Aharon Garushovich Galstyan, known as The Taxi Driver Poisoner, is an Armenian-born Russian serial killer and thief. Operating in St. Petersburg, he would drug his passengers with Azaleptin and rob them of their valuables, and in seven cases, his victims died, their bodies discarded near bodies of water. Despite his insistence on his innocence, Galstyan was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment with no chance of parole.
Yasutoshi Kamata, known as The Osaka Ripper, was a Japanese serial killer responsible for the murder and dismemberment of four women and one girl in Osaka between 1985 and 1994. The case was designated by the National Police Agency as "Metropolitan Designated Case No. 122".
Alexey Olegovich Vygovsky, known as The Station Poisoner, is a Russian serial killer and thief who, together with two accomplices, poisoned 32 people from 2006 to 2009 in the Moscow metro stations in order to rob them, resulting in 17 fatalities. For his crimes, he would later be convicted and sentenced to 22 years and 3 months imprisonment.
Luo Shubiao, known as The Rainy Night Butcher, was a Chinese serial killer and rapist. After committing a rape-murder in 1977 and serving a prison sentence for theft, he started targeting young women around Guangzhou, killing a further eighteen victims from 1990 to 1994. Luo would be convicted of these murders and subsequently executed a year later.
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