REVEALED: The 12 shoplifters AOC defended after they stole diapers and formula are repeat offenders with arrests for assault, robbery, arson and strangulation
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 32, slammed the NYPD for demonizing Bronx shoplifters as 'monsters'
- Arrest records released by police show all but one of the 12 have multiple prior arrests, many for violent crimes
- Most were arrested for drug possession as well as having stolen goods
- The liberal congresswoman represents an upper middle class section of Western Queens and parts of the Bronx
- Diapers and baby formula are often stolen because they are easier to resell on the streets
- Crime in the 44th Precinct where the shoplifters were arrested has spiked by nearly 30 percent
- Overall, crime is up 46.5 percent across the five boroughs
The accused New York City shoplifters that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defended as struggling families forced into a life of crime due to lack of federal support are actually repeat offenders who have lengthy rap sheets.
After a string of shoplifting thefts of retail stories in the Bronx, NYPD officers in the 44th Precinct arrested a dozen people on February 8, 9, 11 and 12. Police touted the arrest on Twitter with photos of the arresting officers and the $1,800 worth of household goods, including diapers, recovered.
In response, Ocasio-Cortez, who represents the upper middle class Long Island City neighborhood in Queens and portions of the Bronx, cast doubt on the legitimacy of the arrests, suggesting that police had gone after impoverished people who were stealing to supply their own babies with diapers and formula.
‘It’s much easier to frame people who steal baby formula and medicine as monsters to be jailed than acknowledge our politics and economic priorities create conditions where people steal baby formula to survive,’ she had tweeted on Thursday.
But a look at the defendants’ criminal records released by the NYPD indicates that this was far from the criminals' first run-in with the law, except Jose Perez, 42, of Soundview. His first arrest came on February 8 when he was arrested for shoplifting, possession of stolen goods and drugs.
Among the dozen arrested, Weston Coot, 38, of Grand Concourse, had been convicted of assault after he glassed a man in the face in a Hell's Kitchen bar fight in 2009. It was his second felony arrest. He has eight arrests in his rap sheet.
Tanya Thomas, 43, has 26 priors, including prostitution and robbery. Euniya Morales, 34, of Claremont Village, has been arrested 22 times, including for assault. Annieza Saulmarshall, 39, of Highbridge, has a past arson charge in addition to burglary, evidence tampering and contempt. Carlos Bonet landed in jail after obstructing someone's breathing, in addition to 15 other criminal offenses over his lifetime. He has something in common with Urayoan Reyes, 39, who was busted for strangulation, along with criminal mischief and other violent crime.
Jennifer Pino, 43, of Concourse, Prince Singleton, 38, of East Harlem, Eugene Morrison, 46, of South Ozone Park, Queens, Shahana Taylor, 64, of Highbridge, and Santos Negron, 41, of Wakefield, were also busted for shoplifting and have lengthy prior records.
In addition to making the shoplifting arrests of the dirty dozen, police closed 23 warrants and recovery of $1,800 worth of merchandise, according to the NYPD.
This is the second time Ocasio-Cortez has blamed the city's spiraling crime rate on child tax credits being withdrawn. In an interview published with The New Yorker on Monday, she said 'we don't want to say some of the thing that are obvious, like gee, the child-tax credit just ran out ... and now people are stealing baby formula.'
Crime is on the rise throughout New York City, especially in the South Bronx where the arrests were made. In the 44th Precinct, overall crime has jumped 27.5 percent, according to NYPD statistics. Car theft spiked 177 percent since last year, records show, and robbery has spiked by 45 percent.
Overall, crime is up 46.5 percent across the five boroughs.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slammed cops for demonizing shoplifters who she says are forced into crime by the lack of federal aid. She chided her colleagues in Congress for not furthering the child tax credit.
Ocasio-Cortez was slammed for her comments in The New Yorker, which came after a 35-year-old Asian advertising creative, Christina Yuna Lee, was knifed to death in her Chinatown apartment by a free-on-bail homeless career criminal.
Brian Chin, Lee's landlord, called the left-wing firebrand 'unbelievably naïve and completely irresponsible' for the comments.
Assamad Nash, 25, was arrested for the Sunday morning murder of Lee and was charged with sexually-motivated burglary by prosecutors Monday, as it was revealed Lee was found topless in the bathtub of her Chinatown apartment in the early hours of the morning. He is currently being held without bail.
In her comments to The New Yorker, Ocasio-Cortez said: 'We don't want to have that discussion. We want to say these people are criminals or we want to talk about ''people who are violent,'' instead of ''environments of violence,'' and what we're doing to either contribute to that or dismantle that.'
Chin said: 'That is an unbelievably naïve statement and completely irresponsible on behalf of her, but it also shows the amount of distance that our elected officials have from the community themselves.'
He continued: 'All of the crimes he committed, including the assault in the subway station, were just steps away from the building. This man was a menace to the community. He was an outright danger.'
Americans with children received a monthly $250 to $300 stipend from the federal government over the course of the pandemic. The temporary support was set to be permanent in President Biden's multi-trillion-dollar Build Back Better funding project, but the sweeping legislation died in the Senate.
Christina Yuna Lee, 35, (left) was stabbed to death in her New York City apartment by a 'homeless serial criminal', Assamad Nash (right) who was free on bail
Chin told Fox News on Tuesday that the left-wing firebrand was 'unbelievably naïve and completely irresponsible' for her comments
In this week's shoplifting bust where the 12 people were arrested, police did not say from where the items were stolen, but across the country pharmacy chain stores like Duane Reade, CVS and Walgreens have complained of brazen and widespread shoplifting, sometimes by organized rings.
Ocasio-Cortez also claimed in December that there was no data to back up rising crime rates, especially in retail, where rings have targeted stores for multiple thefts.
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'A lot of these allegations of organized retail theft are not actually panning out,' she told the Washington Times. 'I believe it's a Walgreens in California cited it, but the data didn't back it up.'
She was slammed by the head of the Retail Industry Leaders Association, Jason Brewer, who said 'she has no idea what she's talking about'.
'Both the data and stack of video evidence makes fairly clear that this is a growing problem in need of solutions,' he said.
Crime in New York is up over 41 percent compared to last year, with transit incidents up 74 percent compared to this time in 2021
Nearly every single police precinct in New York City has seen spikes in crime so far this year - including five in which the rate has doubled, new data from the NYPD shows
In January, four shoplifters armed with hammers broke into a Bay Area Walgreens and nabbed $2,400 worth of cosmetics and other goods.
In November, a van smashed through a Baltimore Walgreens and thieves stole a cash machine.
A lawyer for the pharmacy said that their business was suffering because of the thefts.
'Organized retail crime is one of the top challenges' the company is facing, he said. Crime 'has evolved beyond shoplifting and petty theft to the sale of stolen and counterfeit goods online.'
In Manhattan, where the newly sworn in District Attorney Alvin Bragg vowed not to prosecute on non-violent shoplifters, some stores have closed because the thefts had gotten so bad.
Shelves are already bare in the Rite Aid store, located at the corner of 80th Street and 2nd Avenue because it will shut its doors for good on February 15, the manager told DailyMail.com, a day after a thief was caught on video boldly sauntering out with shopping bags full of stolen goods
Empty shelves are seen at Rite Aid on the Upper East Side just three weeks before they're set to close. The store's closure is just one of many in the city. On February 8, a Hell's Kitchen store which has been rife with robberies in recent months will close, and on the Upper West Side, another store which experienced daily thefts shut down in Novembe
The Upper East Side Rite Aid pharmacy was forced to close its doors on February 15 because shoplifting had gotten so bad.
In January, Actor Michael Rappaport, who lives close to the store, recorded a brazen shoplifter, boosting two shopping bags worth of goods from the store without fear of reprisal.
'Back in my Rite Aid,' he said in a video posted to his on Sunday. 'And there's nothing to steal because this Rite Aid like so many other Rite Aids is closing down because everybody stole everything. And the workers here don't know if they're getting jobs.
Rapaport said the man in his footage filled two bags with stolen goods before nonchalantly strolling past security and leaving
The Rite Aid in the video will be closing on February 15, with thefts a major reason, the pharmacy chain announced late December
Another store in Midtown Manhattan and a Rite Aid in Brooklyn Heights were also forced to close because of thefts.
The chain announced last year that it was shutting down about 63 stores across the US in the next few years, citing cost-cutting measures to save $25 million a year - but workers say that the thefts are part of the reason for the closures as inventory dwindles.
Walgreens shuttered five stores in San Francisco last year, in part, the company says because of thefts, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
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