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Turned into status symbols by celebrities, they’re being ripped from their owners at knifepoint. No wonder police are alarmed at the rise in thefts of… The £1,800 Canada Goose jackets putting a target on the backs of teenagers

Mid-afternoon at a train station in a leafy London suburb, fringed by £1.5 million red-brick villas and a £13,000-a-term private boarding school.

A young man in a black jacket is cowering on the platform as two youths, their faces obscured by hoods and masks, punch and kick him in front of horrified bystanders.


He shouts, ‘Get off, get off,’ as the attackers repeatedly grab at his jacket and push him to the ground, before running down the platform and disappearing on to the street.

Video footage of this appalling attack, which took place last week at Elmstead Woods, Bromley, was shared online and subsequently led to the arrest of two 16-year-old boys.


Their target? It would seem it was his jacket, a much sought-after, furry-hooded parka by the designer brand Canada Goose, with a price tag of up to £1,800. 


The victim, who hasn’t been identified, was lucky: he escaped the assault relatively unharmed, with his expensive jacket still on his back.

However, this isn’t the first time Canada Goose coats — a clothing item worn by A-listers from Nicole Kidman to Rihanna — have been targeted. Recently there has been a worrying spate of attacks, many of them on children.

Caught: Footage shows two 16-year-olds attacking a youth wearing a Canada Goose coat at Elmstead Woods, Bromley

Caught: Footage shows two 16-year-olds attacking a youth wearing a Canada Goose coat at Elmstead Woods, Bromley


The target was believed to be his jacket, a much sought-after, furry-hooded parka by the designer brand Canada Goose, with a price tag of up to £1,800 (stock image)

The target was believed to be his jacket, a much sought-after, furry-hooded parka by the designer brand Canada Goose, with a price tag of up to £1,800 (stock image)


Last month, a 13-year-old from Hornchurch, East London, was cornered by a group of youths who stole his Canada Goose jacket and mobile phone.

In March, another 13-year-old was forced to hand over his coat to a teenage gang on bikes who surrounded him on his walk home from school in Swindon, Wiltshire.


One teenager was held at knifepoint for his coat in Cheshire, while a 15-year-old in Liverpool had his head stamped on by four youths who stole his £1,100 jacket.

Recently, a shocking video surfaced on TikTok, apparently showing another victim, sitting in a hospital emergency room with a deep vertical scar down one side of his face. ‘Don’t die for Canada Goose,’ he had written in the caption.

That an item of clothing, albeit one with a steep price tag, could provoke such violent and senseless attacks is unnerving. But these incidents are part of a wider, deeply worrying wave of luxury item thefts, which have risen by 83 per cent in the past year.



Last month, Transport for London revealed data showing thefts of high-end goods rose from 2,935 in 2022 to 5,378 in 2023.

For youngsters (Canada Goose is a brand coveted particularly by teenagers) who own one of these coats, social media is full of ominous warnings: ‘Wearing Canada Goose puts a target on your back,’ reads one comment on TikTok. ‘Owning a Canada Goose in London has you fearing for your life,’ says another.

But thefts may not be as random or opportunistic as they seem.


Experts told the Mail that many of the Canada Goose attacks are likely being orchestrated by gangs, motivated by money, status and bragging rights on social media.

Some of them are being filmed specifically to attract ‘likes’ and clicks online; others are sick initiation challenges set by gang leaders, testing the mettle of prospective members by ordering them to steal one of the jackets.


‘We know the youths involved are often in gangs, primarily young men aged between 14 and 20 — the same age as their victims,’ explains Daniel Garnham, president of the Security Industry Federation, who worked as an officer with the British Transport Police for 20 years and has first-hand experience of investigating Canada Goose thefts.


‘It’s typically planned: there are five or six of them who go somewhere they don’t live, somewhere there will be rich pickings. They know there’ll be other teenagers there who aren’t as streetwise as they are, wearing hundreds of pounds worth of designer clothes.’

Rihanna is pictured in a Canada Goose jacket in 2016

Rihanna is pictured in a Canada Goose jacket in 2016

These youth gangs differ from the larger, organised crime groups who have been known to target designer outlets — including Canada Goose shops — to make off with more lucrative hauls.


In 2017, thieves on mopeds carried out a smash-and-grab robbery at the newly-opened Canada Goose flagship store on London’s Regent Street, while in Dublin, where thefts of the jackets have been linked to notorious drug gangs, the city centre store was robbed in January 2021.


‘On a larger scale, there is certainly a market for organised criminals to trade in luxury goods and launder the proceeds of crime through these jackets,’ explains Dr Paul Gilmour, senior lecturer in economic crime at the University of Portsmouth.

‘It’s been happening in America for several years. There are cases reported in Boston, Chicago and Washington DC but it has only just caught on in this country.


‘These coats are going to attract a hefty sum of money, making them a valuable commodity like drugs or other luxury items.’

The recent thefts, however, bear the hallmarks of being carried out by less-established, younger groups with a distinctive modus operandi.

Garnham, whose organisation represents security professionals nationwide, says his members have reported a sharp rise in attacks on the National Rail network.



‘They surround someone in a carriage, knowing there’s nowhere they can go,’ he explains. ‘They target a trainline to and from a big shopping hub, like Westfield Stratford or [designer outlet centre] Freeport in Braintree. They take their phones — and often their shoes, too — so they can’t run or call their parents for help.’

It is, says Professor David Wilson, one of the country’s leading criminologists, reminiscent of the ‘Rolex Rippers’ — the spate of brutal watch thefts last year. ‘The theft of desirable luxury goods is one which has a very long history,’ he explains. ‘Charles Dickens wrote about Fagin and his gang stealing silk handkerchiefs, and training Oliver Twist to do the same.

‘The goods might have changed to Canada Goose jackets, but the phenomenon is a historic and common one. It’s a case of young men identifying an opportunity they can exploit.’


So why have Canada Goose jackets become so coveted among today’s young criminals? Worn by the likes of J-Lo, Daniel Craig and rapper Drake, the company started in 1957 in Toronto, Canada, as a sportswear and outerwear brand, sold mostly to extreme athletes and film crews working in the Arctic.

By 2010, it had become a cult fashion brand with a price tag to match. The cheapest item currently on the website is a pair of £75 socks; its priciest coat is the £1,795 ‘Paradigm Expedition Parka’, said to withstand temperatures of -30C.


Nicole Kidman is pictured wearing a Canada Goose jacket in 2018 in New York City

Nicole Kidman is pictured wearing a Canada Goose jacket in 2018 in New York City 


However, Canada Goose has come under fire for using duck down and coyote fur in the manufacture of its products. In 2019, animal rights campaign group Peta urged shoppers to boycott the brand and, in response, in 2021 the company agreed to stop using real fur.

Meanwhile, celebrity endorsement has cemented it as a symbol of wealth, class and status for today’s youth. Chartered psychologist Dirk Flower, an expert in adolescent psychology, adds: ‘Some of it is driven by social media. You can present yourself as being someone in [one of the coats]. It’s worn for credit in the social media world.’ 

Canada Goose certainly holds serious sway online. It is tagged in almost 380 million videos on TikTok, where fans post videos of their latest purchases and ‘hauls’ from designer outlets.


But not only does social media fuel young thieves’ desire for a coat of their own, it’s also a forum where they can — hidden from public view — buy and sell stolen jackets and swap intel on mugging spots. 


Insiders suggest they may also be incentivised to video and upload the attacks themselves, earning a sort of sickening cachet among gang members.

Some gangs, explains Flower, groom children by getting them to steal high-end goods, which the younger thief then has to ‘earn’ by doing their dirty work.


Garnham says some of the criminals he helped to catch blamed initiation ceremonies for their actions. ‘They said stealing the jacket was part of an initiation to join a particular group, a sort of ‘show us what you’ve got’.’

It’s little consolation for the victims, many of whom are left not only without their prized jacket, but terrorised and afraid to go out.

Some, like the TikToker with the facial stab wound, are left in agony after brutal assaults. For others, the consequences are even worse.



In March 2021, law student Hussain Chaudhry, 18, was fatally stabbed at his home in Walthamstow, East London, by two thugs, also 18, who’d feigned interest in buying a Canada Goose jacket he’d advertised for sale online.

They held the teenager captive at knifepoint while they searched his home for more jackets, but a fight broke out when Hussain tried to protect his mother and two brothers, who were also in the house at the time.

The attackers were convicted of manslaughter, robbery and GBH in 2022, but nothing, said his devastated family, ‘will ever ease the pain of losing Hussain’.


As for other criminals who target owners of the jackets, Chris Casey, chief superintendent of the British Transport Police, says the force is ‘relentlessly committed to bringing offenders to justice’.

For the most part, however, the jackets are difficult to track down as they end up being sold online for quick cash-in-hand, on virtually untraceable resale websites such as Gumtree, eBay and Facebook Marketplace.


An investigation by the Mail found several suspicious-sounding adverts for Canada Goose coats on these sites, by users with little or no profile information, or who had recently signed up — all signs they may be passing on stolen goods.


One ad, on Gumtree, from a new user in south-west London, features an ‘original’ Canada Goose parka jacket for £800. ‘Negotiable. Feel free to text. Need to sell it ASAP,’ the advert reads.

Meanwhile on Facebook Marketplace, there’s a dark blue jacket going for £250. ‘Open to offers, let me know ASAP. Need gone,’ the seller has written.

The very existence of this black market for stolen coats, says Professor Wilson, is part of the problem. ‘If you’re being offered a Canada Goose jacket for less than £500, it’s quite clear it’s stolen. We need to give some of the responsibility for this phenomenon to the people who buy these stolen items.


‘If it wasn’t so easy to sell them on, if the market didn’t exist, then the problem of the thefts wouldn’t exist.’


To the owners of Canada Goose coats he urges caution. ‘You have to be vigilant for opportunists who might try to steal them,’ he says. ‘Be careful, be aware of your surroundings and know who’s around you.

‘As soon as the weather gets warmer, they’ll move on — and there’ll be something else for them to target.’


  • Additional reporting, Stephanie Condron

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