DA Krasner plans to individually review charges against every person arrested in Philly looting last week

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Philadelphia’s District Attorney Larry Krasner says he’ll mete out ‘individual justice’ for the 70 people arrested for looting last week.

Groups of young people, apparently working together, smashed their way into stores in several areas of Philadelphia last Wednesday, stuffing plastic bags with merchandise and fleeing, according to police.

The incidents came on the same day a judge dismissed charges against a city police officer accused of murder. Police and city officials have said repeatedly that the two incidents are not connected.

Police made a total of 70 arrests and DA Larry Krasner said they have opened cases in all but one of them. He said he would hand out justice appropriately for what he referred to as “unrest.”

“A very large number of them are young. They’re between the ages of 18 and 25 and in general what we are seeing is most of them have no criminal record or a minimal criminal record, but that isn’t all of them,” Krasner said Monday.

“There certainly are some people in this group who are much more concerning than others,” Krasner said. “Part of our task will be to make sure that we do individual justice in each one of these cases.”

Sheriff Rochelle Bilal sent out a warning to those who wanted to participate in the looting.

“This act of stealing not only costs millions in damages to stores, but can also cost lives. Is stealing a cell phone or sneakers worth someone’s life?” Bilal said. “I’m calling on clergy and Community stakeholders to join with us today and start talking about the bad behavior that we were witnessing.”

The sheriff added that those who get swayed by people on social media urging them to commit crimes will end up in handcuffs.

Krasner said several of his victim coordinators have been tasked with working with merchants to help with the things that “insurance doesn’t cover.” He said his office would work to make sure that the merchants who had damage and items stolen were made whole, even if it took soliciting donations similar to what happened following the unrest that occurred after the killing of George Floyd.