• You must be logged in to see or use the Shoutbox. Besides, if you haven't registered, you really should. It's quick and it will make your life a little better. Trust me. So just register and make yourself at home with like-minded individuals who share either your morbid curiousity or sense of gallows humor.

bowling68

Well-Known Member
1psebdDm.jpg


A 24-year-old Brooklyn man is accused of toddling off with thousands of dollars worth of diapers from area grocery stores, officials said Friday.

Kevin Hargrove was arrested for the dirty deeds at his Bushwick home Thursday, cops said.

He is accused of swapping the price codes on diapers inside Stop & Shop supermarkets on Long Island with tags from 99-cent items and then using the self-checkout.

He most often substituted the tag from a disposable pie plate, officials said.

“If I had to guess I’ve hit every Stop & Shop in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut,” an apparently unremorseful Hargrove told cops, according to court papers. “I’ve been doing this so long I can’t remember.”

The young father told detectives he was keeping some diapers for his own family but was stealing mostly to sell them on the street, officials said. He stole a wide variety of brands and sizes.

Hargrove has struck more than 100 times since January, a spokesman for the Nassau County District Attorney said.

In one incident, he paid a rock-bottom $1.06 for $99.36 worth of diapers at a Stop & Shop in West Hempstead on Jan. 23, according to prosecutors.

“We are fully cooperating with the authorities who are investigating these incidents,” a Stop & Shop spokeswoman said in a statement.

Stop & Shop executives are scrutinizing years of records in light of Hargrove’s confession that he’d been swiping diapers for years, officials said.

“We anticipate that this is going to grow,” a law enforcement source said.
[...]
Hargrove was arraigned Friday in Nassau County First District Court in Hempstead, L.I., on charges of grand larceny and falsifying business records.

He was ordered held in lieu of $6,000 bond.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/ny-man-accused-of-stealing-thousands-worth-of-diapers/ar-AAb9JV3
 
Formula is a big shoplifters draw too -- or so I've heard. Baby items are expensive. When my kids were little I think I paid maybe $4.00 a container. I've heard it's up to something like $9.00 or so now.
 
Formula is a big shoplifters draw too -- or so I've heard. Baby items are expensive. When my kids were little I think I paid maybe $4.00 a container. I've heard it's up to something like $9.00 or so now.
I've seen formula in locked cases in the stores now. Mostly in the much larger areas than where I live.

It makes sense. My boys all had to be on special and extremely expensive formula. Some lab-created hypoallergenic crap that cost, ready for this, $30.00 a can.
 
I've seen formula in locked cases in the stores now. Mostly in the much larger areas than where I live.

It makes sense. My boys all had to be on special and extremely expensive formula. Some lab-created hypoallergenic crap that cost, ready for this, $30.00 a can.
And even for people of low enough income to get assistance... They don't get enough to actually last the month. Can't let the baby starve, and if you have to work and are from a low income family it's hard to afford a breast pump that'll keep a supply. It's kind of a sad social commentary that there's such a market for these things.
 
And even for people of low enough income to get assistance... They don't get enough to actually last the month. Can't let the baby starve, and if you have to work and are from a low income family it's hard to afford a breast pump that'll keep a supply. It's kind of a sad social commentary that there's such a market for these things.
Ugh, how well I remember those times. my boys are well out of the formula days but I can still so clearly remember that monthly struggle. My youngest will be 9 this year, Hell, the $30.00 formula could and probably does cost more now. I can't imagine trying to buy enough formula today, I'd need a second job just for that.

You're so right, it's just sad and utterly pathetic too. Pathetic that families can be forced to struggle so much for something so basic.
 
The black diaper market...? The fuck.
Black diaper market. My favorite pun this week. Hey, I have a weakness for puns. Especially the puns where one says "groannnnnnn."
On to practical matters.. How did he sneak a $1.06 purchase of $96 worth of diapers past a cashier? Did he also buy 25 of $1 items like more pie plates, etc? The fraudulent items would be 'buried' in the pile and the cashier would not notice in the rush? Or did the cashier notice and not care? Was there ever an in-store accomplice? Like his cousin was a cashier?
In my area, a Vice President of SAP (huge software company) was arrested for the same kind of price tag swapping crime. He bought a few low priced Lego products, scanned the UPCs at home, printed more labels then pasted tags on the high priced Legos. He did this at a few Target stores. Well, a software expert like he allegedly was should have guessed that Target has a very good fraud software of their own, and they noticed a pattern of inventory inconsistencies at certain stores, checked their cash register videos and figured it out. Usually people get caught because they get greedy and buy too much of the same thing.
http://www.wired.com/2013/08/langenbach/
Anyway, the Lego thief got off easy. One month jail. 5 months house arrest, probation. I bet the diaper thief spends much more time in jail!
 
  • QUOTE: “We anticipate that this is going to grow,” a law enforcement source said.
Now that the secret is out on how to do it. People probably has been doing it forever though. Another reason why I can not understand why certain people continue to have more and more children. If you struggled with the first two or three then don't have the other four or five or six.......I have clients every day that have eight and more and constantly asking for help with food and rent and housing. Don't any of these people see the freaking obvious?

QUOTE: The fraudulent items would be 'buried' in the pile and the cashier would not notice in the rush? Or did the cashier notice and not care? Was there ever an in-store accomplice? Like his cousin was a cashier?

Self checkouts don't have a cashier and actions like this is to easy to get away with. The bar codes are apparently pealable and need to be part of the plastic packaging. Thieves like this one I detest and loath. Yes we all have it hard and struggle from time to time but don't people like this ever think what they are doing wrong and not fair. I wouldn't be able to function with that level of guilt!
 
And even for people of low enough income to get assistance... They don't get enough to actually last the month. Can't let the baby starve, and if you have to work and are from a low income family it's hard to afford a breast pump that'll keep a supply. It's kind of a sad social commentary that there's such a market for these things.
You can get a breast pump now thru the WIC office. They will give you a Medella pump, the $300 one. All private insurance has to cover breast pumps now.
 
QUOTE: Do your self-check-outs not weight the items?

Yes. Kind of. It does not send out any alerts to anyone if you don't bag it right away. It is so easy though to pay for your stuff and leave without anyone being suspicious of why something didn't get put in the bagging area and weighed. Sometimes there are cashiers monitoring registers and what's going on but all anyone has to do is wait for someone to interrupt the cashier asking for help and they can slide right by them and out in no time.
 
And even for people of low enough income to get assistance... They don't get enough to actually last the month. Can't let the baby starve, and if you have to work and are from a low income family it's hard to afford a breast pump that'll keep a supply. It's kind of a sad social commentary that there's such a market for these things.

Wow, really? I used to take a friend of my dtr's to p/u and cash her WIC vouchers and they used to provide 31 cans of formula a month for infants up to six months old, then supplimental formula, baby cereal, and a few other supplimental foods per month after that until the child was two years old. Of course, this was like 10 or 12 years ago, but assistance has actually gone down?
 
Wow, really? I used to take a friend of my dtr's to p/u and cash her WIC vouchers and they used to provide 31 cans of formula a month for infants up to six months old, then supplimental formula, baby cereal, and a few other supplimental foods per month after that until the child was two years old. Of course, this was like 10 or 12 years ago, but assistance has actually gone down?

31? I'm skeptical. I have six kids ages 18 to 3, and the most cans of formula I ever got a month was 11. And it's gone down to 10 now.
 
31? I'm skeptical. I have six kids ages 18 to 3, and the most cans of formula I ever got a month was 11. And it's gone down to 10 now.

:eek: My eyes are literally bugging out! No way! She was also on full public assistance benefits/welfare benefits and I helped her carry out one 30 count case + 1 can of SMA formula concentrate every month! 10-11 cans with no other income besides state assistance??
 
:eek: My eyes are literally bugging out! No way! She was also on full public assistance benefits/welfare benefits and I helped her carry out one 30 count case + 1 can of SMA formula concentrate every month! 10-11 cans with no other income besides state assistance??

Maybe she got more cause she got concentrate instead of powder like I did?

Idk, but its ten cans of powder now. A can lasts about two or three days.
 
Ahh.. Yeah something fishy. I know plenty of people that got assistance from wic with formula and it was maybe 10 or 11 cans, and usually lasted half the month. I spent a while doing breastfeeding support/education at a local center for low income women. The ones that could not continue nursing -struggled.- Even with wic and food stamps. We saw so many underweight/sick babies because moms watered down formula to make it last.
 
Maybe she got more cause she got concentrate instead of powder like I did?

Idk, but its ten cans of powder now. A can lasts about two or three days.

Omg...I've been out of the loop so long I didn't know any of this was going on. Re: formula babies, WIC was specifically set up to make sure infants get *all* the basic nutrition they need w/o having to use food stamps/Vision card/EBT benefit $$ to buy formula, cereal and juice for them. It would've never dawned on me state govs. would cut back on WIC, fgs.

You may be right about the liquid concentrate vs. the powdered formulas (hers were liq. concentrate specific), but it shouldn't matter. Whoever's doing the powder to concentrate ratios needs to take a look at their effing math if overall, baby's are running out too soon every month.

I can see the odd case where someone is feeding on demand and may overfeed the average here and there, but an overall pattern of not meeting the monthly/daily RDA in different states? Uh uh. If this is the case, they're either deliberately shafting moms/kids on bulk, powdered formula conversions to "save money", doing something else hinky, or somebody's got their fingers in the state tills. Wow.

Anyone here on WIC getting infant formula concentrate in cans, and if so, how many reg. sized cans are you vouchered for per month? This is really weirding me out. And, not in a good way. :grumpy:
 
Last edited:
@gatekeeper I found a PDF online for Michigan. In Michigan just regular Enfamil A R WIC provides max per month of 10 powdered 12.9 oz cans or 28 RTF 32 fl oz can for infants 1 year or less. It also addresses special needs formulas etc.

I remember when my boys were small I always had to buy additional formula before months end.
 
Awesome, thank you! I was going to pull up KS and MO current WIC formula allowances here in a minute and compare the stats, then see if I can find anything different from 10+ years ago if it's still published online (don't know why it wouldn't be). Now, I can compare Michigan, too. Appreciate it. :)
 
My son had pyloric stenosis & required a pre-digested formula-- thank god my insurance covered it in full-
P6230.jpg

The retail price is $30 a can!

I def don't miss those days- predigested formula made my son's diapers TOXIC! So bad that we would have to leave stores & I could tell from downstairs if he had a dirty diaper up in his crib!!!:wtf:
 
#1 - moms whose formula costs are/were $30 (or more) a can [enter twitchy eye]...I knew formula was high, even back when mine were biting, baby monsters I had to switch to formula b/c both of them cut way too many fangs way too early, but I had no idea specialty formulas at $30/can were even in the universal realm of possibility. :dead:

#2 - I've been doing a little (lotta) online checking and playing with the calculator doing mass/volumetric and overall, gross quantity conversions for the last 30 min., and based on the USDA RDA WIC guidelines and the American Academy of Pediatrics formula feeding recommendations, the math for the amount of formula (both powdered and liq. concentrate) at the Federal level is actually a skosh over the monthly RDA/AAP recs. And, though it seems like a small amt. over a month's time (except for infants 0-3 mos. who'd be shorted one 3oz. feeding per day, for example), it's really not. There's an avg. 90 oz./month (3 oz./day) variance between per unit monthly powdered formula yields and reconstituted liquid concentrate yields.

Though from the reading, all powder calcs (yield = mass/gm wgt. + ozs. volume) for standard powdered formulas are basically the same at 9gms. per scoop, since Bowling68 already mentioned it earlier, here's the standard dilution/yield ratios for Enfamil A R (as an example), including household measure:

https://www.meadjohnson.com/pediatrics/us-en/sites/hcp-usa/files/Enf-ARVar-Dil-342_0_0.pdf

These are all the easy-to-read, WIC food package charts for all categories of WIC food recipients, including what amounts of what are designated at what ages, again, on the federal (pre-state disbursement) level:

http://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/wic-food-packages-maximum-monthly-allowances

Here's the actual USDA/WIC Handbook (pdf link for formula feeding recommendations):

http://wicworks.nal.usda.gov/infants/infant-feeding-guide

And finally, an excellent, easy, quick read article from About.com on variable feeding amounts r/t formula feedings with AAP (Amer. Academy of Peds) refs:

http://pediatrics.about.com/od/weeklyquestion/a/04_formula_amts.htm

*Just to clarifiy, since the federal regs match up and they just give lump sum grant checks to state WIC agencies (the feds don't print the vouchers/load the cards, etc.), I'm reiterating that IMPO, something at the state disbursement level is stinkin' worse than dirty diapers...

Apologies for drifting away from the black market, disposable, butt cover huckster. Yet another thing I didn't even know was a *thing.* Crikey, somebody loan me a baby til my son knocks somebody up, please? I'm feeling WAY outta touch over here! :arghh: Lol.
 
Last edited:
@gatekeeper I am fascinated with your analytical mind. :shame: Thank you for sharing your findings.

So, the federal funding meets the RDA but by the time it actually gets distributed we are short one 3 oz daily feeding. I didn't realize how much that was until I converted it to cups...11.25 cups over a month's time. That's a lot for a growing baby. No wonder I was always buying more before the end of the month.:eek:
 
@gatekeeper I am fascinated with your analytical mind. :shame: Thank you for sharing your findings.

So, the federal funding meets the RDA but by the time it actually gets distributed we are short one 3 oz daily feeding. I didn't realize how much that was until I converted it to cups...11.25 cups over a month's time. That's a lot for a growing baby. No wonder I was always buying more before the end of the month.:eek:

Bingo! There it is, and it's absolutely disgusting. I know I may take heat from public assistance haters who'll holler, "Boo hoo, first world entitlement issues!", but I'm going to say it anyway. With all the shit our grant money/tax dollars are wasted on in this country, it's appalling that even one state government, let alone who knows how many all tolled, are literally taking food out of infants mouths by not rightfully dispersing each and every taxpayer subsidized penny to the families and children that money is *expressly* collected for and set aside to help.

It may be another "so what, can't do anything about it," issue, and, I'm not stupid enough to believe our governments on any level aren't loaded with greedy, opportunistic, deep-pocket thieves and liars, but it never even occurred to me they'd be so low down dirty as to short infants on baby formula, fgs. And, it also just occurred to me I really resent the fact I actually had to type that sentence. Smdh. :pout:
 
Last edited:
My son had pyloric stenosis & required a pre-digested formula-- thank god my insurance covered it in full-
That's it! For the life of me I couldn't remember the name of it.

2 of my 3 were on this and there was no insurance coverage for us, WIC provided some but not enough. I'm definitely glad those days are long gone.
 
I would urge any parent who's child requires a specialty formula to try & get a diagnosis from your pediatrician or a specialist-- my son's pediatrician 'suggested' we put him on Alimentum for which we were paying $30 per can-- but once we got him actually diagnosed by the gastroenterologist, he was able to write an actual prescription for that specialty formula. We would pick up 4 cases per month right at the pharmacy which was plenty & we never paid a cent-- not even a co-pay & my son was on a state assisted health ins (my hubs & I went uninsured for years until his current job provided ins for all of us- scary!)
 
My rugrats had prescriptions for it but insurance never covered it, that's what WIC was for according to them. Back then I have horrific medical insurance, seriously, I think it was worse than when I had no coverage. I had to have an emergency C-section with my youngest and they tried to get out of covering that saying that the doctor should have let labor progress to see if I could have delivered naturally. My son was stuck with the cord prolapsing, they did the C-section when his heart rate dropped below 50 and wouldn't come back up.

Like I said really bad insurance.
 
The biggest problems we had with WIC was all the face-to-face meetings at the WIC office and these often included classes. I understand the need to make sure everyone is educated about nutrition and children's needs, but it's made more difficult because you have to take the kid(s) with you. I believe my d-i-l got 9 cans of formula a month which was not enough after several months, and the amount is reduced until they cut it off entirely at 1 yr. All of the juice, milk, cereal, and other such items are the cheapest possible. You know, the ones you won't buy for yourself because they're low quality and don't taste good. They pay for some fresh veg but I was always confused about which ones. I'm sure they covered that in her meetings, but she often wasn't able to go to the store and I was. All I do know is that WIC never covered all the fresh veg that I would buy. We have a hell of a lot of dried beans we got with WIC. The baby food WIC paid for was Gerbers, but, yuck. They wouldn't eat it so I would pay for tastier but more expensive options myself.
 
Back
Top