Jim Jensen spoke at Lunch and Bite of History Thursday. He recounted an unsual retail theft that occurred at his New Ulm Store in the late 1970s.

NEW ULM — Fashion, theft and overcoming setbacks was the theme of Thursday’s Lunch and Bite of History presentation.

Professional speaker, business coach and author Jim Jensen gave a presentation at the Brown County Museum Annex one of the most unusual retail crimes to happen in New Ulm.

For several decades Jensen owned a retail business on Minnesota Street in downtown New Ulm. In the late 1970s, Jensen’s store experienced several thefts perpetrated by a rival business owner.

Jensen began his talk by warning the audience to beware of night crawlers. He said many people think of night crawlers as fat worms, but he said they can come in many forms.

“They try to put fear or worry in our mind,” he said. “Night crawlers can even come in human form.” Jensen’s story involved a human night crawler, who did just that.

A display at Jim Jensen's true crime included photos from the stores. One pictures shows the location of the secret passageway.

Jensen moved to New Ulm in 1966 to work at a men’s clothing store owned by Hugo Neubauer. The store was located in New Ulm’s downtown business district. A few years after moving to New Ulm, Jensen became the owner.

In 1970, Neubauer sold the store to Jensen. The store was successful for three years, after which he had a chance to expand the store. The business next door had closed and Jensen decided to lease it and expand his clothing store. This was good news for the business, but now Jensen’s Clothing store was next door to Fred Meine Jr.’s store.

Jensen said that shortly after signing the lease for the new space he noticed an open door in the basement that led into Meine’s store. At the time, Meine explained the two businesses were in one building and the door led to a common bathroom.

Since the original part of Jensen’s Clothing store already had a bathroom, he felt the common access was unnecessary. Jensen installed a lock on his side of the basement to block off the door. For the next few years, Jensen did not think much of the common door.

A year after opening the addition to Jensen’s Clothing, the store’s chief financial officer asked if there was a shoplifting problem. An inventory of the store concluded some items were missing and possibly stolen. Jensen was unaware of any shoplifting. There were no obvious signs of a break-in and only a few items were unaccounted for.

In 1975, the thefts became more obvious. Jensen said he came into the store early one morning and upon entering the basement he noticed two big doors leading outside to recessed stairs in the back were broken in. After this, he began searching the store for missing inventory. Several leather jackets had been taken. At the time, police thought it was a one-time hit.

In the years since, Jensen came to believe the broken doors leading outside were a decoy to make it look like a break-in when in reality someone had a secret entrance to the store.

Smaller thefts would continue at Jensen’s Clothing, most going unnoticed, but a few were more obvious. Jensen said he became concerned about thefts after a special order suit went missing. The suit was set aside in a backroom for the customer who ordered it. However, on the day the buyer came to pick up the suit, it was gone. This suit could not simply be misplaced. It was a clear sign of theft.

The mysterious thefts were solved in March 1978. It was the day before Easter. Jensen was going to meet his wife at a local shoe store. On his way to the other store, he found several clothing hangers in a garbage can. As the operator of a clothing store, he could not understand why someone would throw away perfectly good hangers. The more he thought about it, the more unusual it seemed. He removed the hangers from the trash can and brought them back to his store. He wondered if it had something to do with the thefts.

One of his employees Steve Jacobson went back to the trash can and returned with even more hangers as well as a brown paper bag containing clothing labels. These labels had been cut off merchandise. Along with the labels were pieces of paper with Fred Meine’s name on it.

Meine became the top suspect. The police were called and began investigating. They searched the basement to see if there were signs of a break-in between the common wall. After two searches, a small scratch was found on the common door that Jensen had blocked off years ago. Though locked, one of the door panels had been cut through.

Meine had created a secret passage between the door to gain entry to Jensen’s store. Meine would crawl through the passage at night and help himself to clothing.

The next step was to confirm the stolen inventory was Meine’s store. Recently, a suit from the “Johnny Carson” line of suits had gone missing. The suit was 44 extra long, a size few stores carried at the time. A customer had wanted to buy the suit, but it had gone missing before he could pick it up.

Jensen and the police enlisted the help of this customer. He was asked to go into Meine’s store, find the suit, buy it and get a receipt. The customer agreed to help and was able to find the Johnny Carson suit in Meine’s store, with the labels removed.

A judge was able to issue a search warrant on Meine’s store and the missing merchandise was found in his store’s basement.

Meine’s store was near bankruptcy and had limited inventory. By stealing from Jensen, he could add to his inventory and put his nearest competitor out of business. Over two years, he would steal thousands of dollars worth of merchandise to re-sell them at his store.

News of the unusual retail theft went national. Jensen said they received newspaper clippings from all over the country. It was even referenced by Johnny Carson on “The Tonight Show.” Carson joked that the theft must have “good taste” because a Johnny Carson suit was what got him caught.

In March 1979, Meine pled guilty and spent a short time in jail with community service. He would leave New Ulm after his sentence was complete.

Jensen said with the inventory back, they had a “theft recovery sale.” With Meine gone, they took over his business place and created a young men’s clothing department.

In 1996, Jensen’s Clothing store moved into the Marketplaz Mall. They closed the store in 2001. Since then, Jensen has become a writer and motivational speaker.

His 2011 book “Thread of Evidence” is based on the unusual theft story. As a motivational speaker, Jensen uses this true story to help others overcome hardships.

“My advice is to be happy, be positive and enjoy every day,” Jensen said. “[But] remember to beware of night crawlers.”