Union agent with long rap sheet charged with shoplifting purse: police

 

January 12, 2010

SUN-TIMES MEDIA WIRE

A 63 year-old Skokie man has been charged with felony shoplifting for stealing a $2,395 purse from a luxury North Michigan Avenue store, police

said.

 

Phil Mazurek, 63, has been charged with one count of felony retail theft-shoplifting for allegedly taking a purse from a store on the 750 block of North Michigan Avenue around 2:30 p.m. Monday, Police News Affairs Officer Hector Alfaro said.

 

A Ralph Lauren retail store is listed at the Michigan Avenue address, according to a Web listing.

 

In a police report Mazurek listed his occupation as a business agent for Liquor & Allied Workers Union Local 3, according to police.

 

Police said Mazurek was inside the Ralph Lauren store with a large Lord & Taylor shopping bag when he allegedly put a black leather purse worth $2,395 inside the bag. Video surveillance captured pictures of him and proceeding to an elevator, police said.

 

After he went past the last point of purchase, he was stopped. Mazurek was held at the scene until police arrived, Alfaro said.

 

Mazurek was convicted in 2005 for a shoplifting that occurred in 2003; he was arrested for burglary in 1988 and was convicted of it in 1989;  he was convicted of retail theft in 1986 and he was convicted of armed robbery in 1974, police said.

 

He was discharged from parole someone in 2009, possibly in the fall.

A spokesperson for the union was not immediately available early Tuesday.

 

As of 3 a.m. Mazurek remained in the lockup at the Near North District police station on the 1160 block of North Larrabee Avenue, but he was scheduled to appear later Tuesday for a bond hearing in Cook County Criminal Court, according to police.