LPRC - CrimeScience – The Weekly Review – Episode 217 Ft. Dr. Justin Smith

Episode Date: September 4, 2025

In this episode of the LPRC CrimeScience Podcast, Dr. Cory Lowe speaks with Dr. Justin Smith about his journey from criminology research to applied innovation at the LPRC. Dr. Smith shares how his academic work on innovation resistance informs real-world challenges in loss prevention, from testing theft deterrent solutions like the Kanga Safe bag to offender interviews and cutting-edge research on ink tags. They also explore the role of the Engagement Lab in helping retailers and Solution Partners discover and evaluate new technologies, and look ahead at projects tackling organized retail crime, restroom security, and the future of AI in loss prevention. Tune in for a behind-the-scenes look at how research and innovation are shaping the next generation of retail security solutions.

Hi everyone and welcome to crime science. In this podcast, we explore the science of crime and the practical application of this science for loss prevention and asset protection practitioners as well as other professionals. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening everyone. My name is Corey Lowe, I'm the director of research here at the LPRC and welcome to the crime science podcast. I'm joined today by one of the research scientists on our team, Dr. Justin, Smith. Justin, how are you doing today? I'm doing great, Corey. It's really good to be here. Really excited about this, so it's a good day. Yes. I'm very excited to have you as well.

I think that I've worked with you longer than just about anybody else on the team, except for, you know, one or two people. So it's very good to have you on today to talk about what you're doing at the LPRC. Before we get into too much of that, though, can you start out by telling everyone a little bit about your academic background and how you got into this type of work? Yeah, absolutely. So it all started for me. Oh, gosh, I hate to say this, but probably about 20 years ago. I just feel old saying that, but I was interested in going to law school. And prior to that, you need to get a bachelor's degree, obviously. And so I was looking at programs to take at Florida Atlantic University. And I found out that they had a criminal justice program.

And I was looking at some of the coursework. And they had classes on like situational crime prevention and environmental criminology. And there was one called crime in everyday life. And I just thought it sounded really interesting. And so I started taking courses there, really liked it. I think what really fascinated me the most was the research that my professors were involved in.

And so I like talking with them after class. I was definitely one of those students that kind of hung around and talked with the professors after class and pick their brains on, you know, all sorts of different topics. And I decided I wanted to go to grad school. But there were some issues that came up with my family. So I was unable to pursue that for a number of years. Eventually went back and started working on my master's degree at FAU. and I took a class called Crime in Everyday Life, which was all about environmental criminology,

criminological theory, situational crime prevention. I just found it really fascinating because I view crime as, you know, one of the ultimate kind of human problems and just understanding the psychology behind it is endlessly fascinating. And I like trying to come up with ways to, you know, slow down and deter offenders,

help them make better decisions and so forth. So I really enjoyed that. And I had some great mentors at FAU that encouraged me to go on and pursue a PhD in criminal justice. And so I enrolled at the University of Central Florida and worked on my PhD there. And while I was there, I studied policing, police culture, also environmental crime, never got away from my roots. And published my dissertation on police innovation and innovation resistance. and I graduated in 2022 and then joined the LPRC, and it's been a good run ever since. So you said that you did your dissertation, you know, that's the major research project that you do when you're pursuing a PhD on police innovation and resistance to innovation.

A lot of what you do today is around innovating solutions in loss prevention and asset protection. How do you think the research that you did on innovation and resistance innovation applies to what you do at the University today? So it's very applicable. There's a theory that I studied and did a partial test on in my dissertation called the model of consumer resistance to innovation. And basically, this theory suggests reasons why consumers, for example, don't go out and buy the latest iPhone. And it has these different barriers to innovation. And I see these barriers all the time in conversations with our retailers and with our solution providers. So, for example, one of the barriers is called usage.

And it suggests that if an innovation is too difficult to use or time consuming to learn how to use it, that people will resist it. Well, I see that a lot with some of the solutions that we are asked to study. a lot of times retailers want to know, hey, how long does it take for a sales associate to remove this tag at the point of sale? How quickly can they put it on? You know, I know in the history of the LPRC, we've actually done time in motion studies to understand, you know, how quickly certain tags can be put on, taken off, or how quickly certain innovations can be used. There's also resistance barriers due to cultural factors, according to the theory. And I've seen this a lot, too, where, where retailers have told us that certain solutions just don't fit their store's culture. And it's just their store has a certain aesthetic and they're not going to implement a solution. It may be a solution that would help solve some of the problems that they're experiencing, but they don't want to implement it because it goes against their store's culture. And then obviously economic risk, that's another innovation resistance barrier.

And we see that a lot in loss prevention as well, that people just don't want to necessarily be the guinea pig, especially if it's some untried, you know, technology that hasn't been tested. Some people are reticent to adopt it because they don't know if it hasn't proven out ROI. So those are just some of the barriers that I see in dealing with loss prevention practitioners. But it's very applicable what I studied in grad school. I see it all the time. Most definitely. And I definitely see all of those barriers in the work that we do here as well. Right now you are heavily engaged in some major projects and roles.

You have some pretty big ones at the LPRC. You wear a lot of different hats. On one hand, you're doing a lot of different product protection trials. Then you have the self-reported offender program where you have offenders coming, through and you're interviewing them on on different solutions but then you also are the namesake for just in the general store or you know the mock store environment that we have here at the LPRC I just want to start talking about the start by talking about the solutions trials that you're doing you know can you tell us about what you're typically trying to

accomplish and you know how that can help the retailers Yeah, absolutely. So one of the trials that we just finished up earlier this year was a test of Sifron's Kenghisafe solution. So Sifron and Patako came up with a solution called the Kanga Safe bag, which is a theft deterrent bag. And we were interested in studying the effectiveness of it, namely what is the effect on shrink? and also what is the effect on sales? So whenever you do a solutions trial, there's a number of things you can look at, but typically that's what retailers want to know is at the bottom line, end of the day, is it going to affect shrink?

And also, what is the effect on sales? Because if you implement a product protection solution, it may stop theft, but it may also be a detriment to sales. And so that was one of the questions that we had about the Kanga Safe bags, that were marketed by SIFRON. And so we actually partnered with two retailers.

They've requested anonymity. So I'll just say one was a general merchandiser and one was a DIY or do-it-yourself retailer. And we did two in-store tests of the Kanga Safe Solution. With the general merchandiser, we looked at men's, socks, t-shirts, and underwear. And then with the DIY retailer, we looked at laser distance measures, chainsaw blades. you know, a little portable power tool, you know, type products. And we saw in both cases that the Kanga Safe bags did lead to marked reductions in shrink. And also, in the case of the general merchandiser, there was an effect on sales, but it was very minor. And in the case of the DIY retailer,

we actually saw an improvement in sales, which was very interesting to see. And I talked with the retailer after the fact. And he said, well, sometimes if you've got an item that's high theft and it's always being stolen, it's just not on the shelf for legitimate customers to purchase. So it could be that you actually see a sales increase in that case. So I thought that was very interesting feedback. And then on top of that, we also did offender interviews. We interviewed 15 self-reported offenders about the Kenga Safebags. And we also interviewed 30 customers. And those interviews are really helpful, you know, to us and also to Sifron because we're able to then communicate feedback about, okay, why is the Kanga Safe Bag effective at reducing theft? What, you know, what is slowing offenders

down? And also, how can it be improved to make it an even better solution from a product protection standpoint? And then the customer interviews help us understand the sales piece. And so if sales do decline, why? And how can that be changed? So that's just, one example of a project that we just wrapped up. I know you've got several others. Yes. Trials going on revolving bathrooms, pedestals that have cameras embedded in them, the EAS pedestals, advanced alerting EAS pedestals, and several other things.

That's just, that's hardly even scratching the surface, I think, but a ton of stuff going on on your end. A big part of it is the self-reported defender initiative. And for most of these projects that you have, there's an offender portion where you're trying to get the preliminary information about, you know, why these solutions might have an effect on offender behaviors or why they wouldn't. Then you can build upon that. Can you tell us a little bit more about that self-reported offender program and what you're

doing, just generally speaking? Yeah, most definitely. So throughout the history of the LPRC, we have interviewed is self-reported offenders in many different areas. So shoplifters, dishonest employees, I know Reed has even done some work interviewing armed robbers. But the point of these interviews is to really understand decision-making and how it is that they make decisions about things like store selection, product selection, you know, different theft techniques. what they do with stolen merchandise, what their motivations are, how they respond to different loss prevention solutions. And so I, earlier this year, began our offender recruitment and

interview program. And the idea is to establish a pipeline where we are regularly interviewing offenders. In this case, since I'm overseed product protection, obviously, I was a little bit selfish, but I'm interested in shoplifting. So right now our focus is on self-reported shoplifters. And we interview offenders on a regular basis, and I have a standardized questionnaire that I administer to all the offenders that come into our lab for an interview. And basically, there's questions on there about a variety of topics, such as, you know, what stores do you frequent and shoplift from, why those particular stores? What products do you take? Why those products? What time of day do you typically shoplift? How do you get there? You know, do you work alone

or do you work as part of a team? You know, when you're in the store, what kinds of deterrence do you look for? What theft techniques do you use? So, you know, are you a push-out artist or, you know, do you like simple concealment? What do you do with stolen merchandise? So are you using it yourself? Are you selling it online? Do you use social media? Do you ever talk about shoplifting on social media?

And then gets into questions also just about their background characteristics. So demographic information, so, you know, age, race, education, income, marital status, children. there are questions about offense history. So prior arrests, convictions. And there's also questions from criminological theories. So we have some self-control measures. We have some social learning measures, strain measures, and so forth. But the idea here is just to build a comprehensive data set about offender decision-making. Key to this also is the solution census. So as part of this, I walk them around the labs

and I show them about 40 different crime prevention solutions in our mock store lab and then record feedback about those solutions. Just to give us a sense of what they view as being a viable deterrent. And so it just allows us to really, really begin to understand some of their decision-making processes. And I was motivated a lot by this project from, you know, Corey, you and some of our listeners

may be familiar with this, but there was a famous study in 1994 by Wright and Decker where they looked at residential burglars. And they interviewed about 100 residential burglars and wanted to understand everything from, you know, how they selected neighborhoods, how they selected a house, how they broke in, what kinds of things they looked for, how they got rid of stolen merchandise. really, you know, that journey to crime, I'd love to do the same thing with shoplifters and keep that in mind with our bowtie model and some of the models that we have about, you know, here at the LPRC about that journey to crime, right? You know, what deterrence do they see in, you know,

zones four, three, two, one. And so, you know, that was really kind of the impetus for the offender program. And I mean, I feel like it's been a tremendous success so far. No, that's a, it is a tremendous success. I think it's always very, interesting for the retailers to hear those insights directly from people who have engaged in these activities. It's the only real way I think that we can begin to figure out what to do exactly. Yeah. And to that point, because I, you know, how it could benefit retailers. So on the product protection working group, I have had retailers ask me questions about, hey, you know, what are offenders saying, for example, about locking cases. And so the neat thing about the program is that,

you know, we collect data on that, but we also have opportunities to go a little bit deeper. So if a retailer or a solution partner wanted us to, you know, ask some questions about a particular solution or class of solutions, by having this ready pool of offenders that we're interviewing on a regular basis, you know, we can get that kind of information. And that can be absolutely beneficial to our members. Fantastic. Of course, you are the driving force behind the engagement lab, also known as Justin's General Store. That's what we know all these solutions at. It's great for research purposes. We can bring in offenders. We can bring in potential customers to understand both groups' reactions to these different solutions that we have in the labs.

But I think that it serves a more important purpose in the industry. I wouldn't say more important. Definitely not more important. It serves another important purpose, which is to show retailers what's actually possible. Show law enforcement what's possible. Show all the stakeholders what's possible when they have a problem, think about the nature of the problem, and then some solutions to those problems that they have. Can you speak a little bit more about how the engagement lab helps retailers identify potential solutions for the problems they face when they come to the labs?

Yeah, so I like to think about Justin's General as the universe of possibilities. So, in other words, this is a location where you can find the latest in loss prevention. technology. We've had retailers come through the LPRC that have had all sorts of different problems, you know, with respect to different theft techniques. A common one I hear is shelf sweep. And so by going through the engagement lab, they get to see some of the solutions that currently exist that they may not be aware of. So for example, shelf sweep. I like to ask retailers when they come through. What are your pain points? What are you having problems with? And, you know, if they give me something like, yeah, shelf sweep, then it's like, okay, here's some solutions that we have

that can help slow down or prevent shelf sweep from occurring, you know. And then also, not only can they see solutions, but they can evaluate them here and understand will this actually work, you know, within our stores, within our own footprint, right? And also the great thing is that we don't sell anything here at the LPRC. You know, we are neutral in all things. And so they can come to this environment and look at the solutions and not be fed a line or a sales pitch. You know, we are here to provide information, certainly, but it's not a high pressure environment. And it's just a unique space to really see what is out there in terms of retail crime prevention.

And I've had retailers tell me that, you know, maybe they've thought of a different use case for a particular product protection solution that, you know, maybe they weren't using here to four of it, then saw it in our lab. And it's like, oh, that might work for us. So it really is a unique space for those reasons. Yeah. And not only do we have the engagement lab where retailers can see these things in person, but they also, you also have this solution. directory online and the solution spotlight that runs a solution every day. So all great resources for learning more about what is actually available out in the world today for product protection, among other things.

You know, looking forward, you've accomplished so much in your, you know, the last few years that you've been with us at the LPRC, but looking forward, What are you looking forward forward to the most? Are there any projects coming up? You know, what areas of offender behavior or product protection are you most excited to explore moving forward? Yeah, that's a great question. So one project that is just getting started right now that I'm really excited about is the restroom crime project. So we are working with one of our solution partners.

and Dime to test Freedom Go, which is a advanced access control system. So some of our retailers have talked to us in the past about problems that they have in the restrooms, so folks going in there and unfortunately using intravenous drugs and overdosing. We also know restrooms or havens for graffiti, vandalism, the shoplifting, I've actually interviewed offenders who've talked about the fact that they use restrooms to facilitate shoplifting by, you know, removing product protection devices and flushing them down the toilet or, you know, removing products from packages. So Endime has this advanced access control system called Freedom Go, which basically picture a lock on the door to the restroom with a keypad on it. And what you can do is input your phone number on that keypad, and it will text you a code.

And then you can enter that code on the keypad, and then that will grant you access to the restroom. So this works on an idea called the value exchange, which is basically, are you as a consumer willing to give up personally identifiable information, in this case your phone number, for access to something you want, which in this case would be the restroom? So we're really interested in testing out this technology and seeing if it makes a difference on some of the shoplifting behavior and other antisocial behavior that we know is occurring in the restrooms. And so we've actually partnered with several retailers to actually do this test where we collect data for a couple of months prior to implementing Freedom Go. And then we're going to implement the technology. We're going to keep collecting data and then see if there's an effect on antisocial behavior and on shoplifting. So I'm really excited about that one. That's just getting started.

As far as I think other areas that I'm interested in, definitely ORC. So ORC obviously is a hot issue. It's not going away. I would like to begin recruiting more ORC offenders. So offenders that have experience, they're experienced boosters that, you know, give their items to fences or some of these offenders we hear that walk into stores, the shopping list and just, you know, go and take things that they know they're going to resell. So I'd like to kind of expand our connections with law enforcement and, you know, with the district attorney's office and just some of our local contacts to see if we can get more ORC and, you know, gang-related offenders, I think would be absolutely. fascinating. And I'm always just, I'm always fascinated just by the latest innovations that we see, you know, coming through the door. I mean, AI was something that, you know, we barely talked

about. I think when I joined the LPRC, you know, when I was in grad school, but now it's really taken off. So just kind of seeing what direction, AI and, you know, computer vision and some of those other, you know, technologies will go in the future, I think is absolutely fascinating. Most definitely. Yeah. Justin, thank you for everything that you do for the LPRC. You do really, really awesome work that's absolutely critical to the industry. So I definitely appreciate it, and I'm sure that the industry does as well.

Thank you. And I'm also looking forward to seeing what you do next. you've always got some things that you're working on. So thank you for spending some time with me today on Crime Science Podcast. I look forward to our next conversation. Thank you. Yeah, thanks for being on, Corey. Appreciate it.

Sir. Thanks for listening to the Crime Science Podcast, presented by the Loss Prevention Research Council. If you enjoyed today's episode, you can find more crime science episodes and valuable information at LPRsearch. The content provided in the Crime Science Podcast is for information. informational purposes only and is not a substitute for legal, financial, or other advice. Views expressed by guests of the Crime Science podcast are those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions or positions of the Loss Prevention Research Council.