(A) For the purpose of this section, the following definitions shall apply unless the context clearly indicates or requires a different meaning.
MERCANTILE ESTABLISHMENT. Any mercantile place of business in, at, or from which goods, wares, and merchandise are sold, offered for sale, or delivered from and sold at retail or wholesale.
MERCHANDISE. All goods, wares, and merchandise offered for sale or displayed by a merchant.
MERCHANT. Any corporation, partnership, association, or person who is engaged in the business of selling goods, wares, and merchandise in a mercantile establishment.
WRONGFUL TAKING. Includes stealing of merchandise or money and any other wrongful appropriation of merchandise or money.
(B) Any merchant, his or her agent or employee, who has reasonable grounds or probable cause to believe that a person has committed or is committing a wrongful taking of merchandise or money from a mercantile establishment, may detain such person in a reasonable manner and for a reasonable length of time for the purpose of investigating whether there has been a wrongful taking of such merchandise or money. Any such reasonable detention shall not constitute an unlawful arrest or detention, nor shall it render the merchant, his or her agent or employee, criminally or civilly liable to the person so detained.
(C) Any person willfully concealing unpurchased merchandise of any mercantile establishment, either on the premises or outside the premises of such establishment, shall be presumed to have so concealed such merchandise with the intention of committing a wrongful taking of such merchandise within the meaning of division (A) above, and the finding of such unpurchased merchandise concealed upon the person or among the belongings of such person shall be evidence of reasonable grounds and probable cause for the detention in a reasonable manner and for a reasonable length of time, of such person by a merchant, his or her agent or employee, in order that recovery of such merchandise may be effected, and any such reasonable detention shall not be deemed to be unlawful, nor render such merchant or his or her agent or employee criminally or civilly liable.
(Prior Code, § 210.390) Penalty, see § 130.999