Ira A. Lipman

Ira Ackerman Lipman (November 15, 1940 – September 16, 2019) was an American businessman and philanthropist.

He was the founder and chairman of Guardsmark, a privately owned security company with a payroll of 17,000 employees and 130 offices in the United States, Puerto Rico, the United Kingdom and France.

Ira A. Lipman was born November 15, 1940 to a Jewish family in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Lipman founded Guardsmark, a security company, in 1963.

He initially founded the company to provide hospitals and factories with a better security services organization.

Within a year, in 1964, he had under 100 employees.

He served as its president and chairman from 1970 to 2015.

In 1971, Lipman disagreed with City College of New York Professor Lawrence Zeitlin's research, which showed companies would save money by letting good employees steal.

Instead, he argued that companies should cut costs by investing in good security to prevent theft.

Lipman believed most theft occurred as a result to addiction to narcotics, and the best way for companies to end this would be to hire undercover security agents, as employees would be more likely to confess to them than policemen.

Meanwhile, in 1972, after President Richard Nixon laid off 1,100 federal airport security agents, Lipman argued that they should be replaced with private armed guards who should be present in airports at all times.

Moreover, Lipman suggested that airport security could be improved if frequent travelers carried with them special cards, as airport security would then focus on irregular travelers and significantly reduce the risks of skyjacking.

He added that passengers should be required to go through metal detectors, their carry-on luggage should be searched, and landing ramps should be equipped with closed-circuit television camera.

By 1973, Lipman expanded his business to shoplifting prevention, especially in the Southeastern United States.

Lipman expanded his business to home security in 1973, initially in Memphis, Houston, New Haven, Connecticut, and Concord, California.

Meanwhile, he also expanded his business to patrolling entire neighborhoods, the first of which was Belle Meade, Tennessee.

By then, he had 3,500 employees active in 35 cities across the United States.

Lipman expanded his business further with bodyguard protection for high-net-worth individuals by 1974.

He argued that this was necessary to prevent kidnappings.

His father, Mark Lipman, was the founder of Mark Lipman Service, a private investigation company, and the author of the 1975 book Stealing: How America's Employees Are Stealing Their Companies Blind.

His mother was Belle Ackerman.

He was a member of Aleph Zadik Aleph.

Lipman was educated at the Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.

While he was in high school, Lipman acted as an anonymous source to journalist John Chancellor, who was covering desegregation.

Lipman authored a book about security entitled How To Protect Yourself From Crime: Everything You Need To Know To Guard Yourself, Your Family, Your Home, Your Possessions, And Your Business in 1975.

By 1976, Lipman's company handled security for 20 airports in the United States.

A 1981 report from the United States Department of Justice's Law Enforcement Assistance Administration quoted Lipman's advice that having a dog in the house was an efficient deterrent for burglaries.

A decade later, in 1983, Lipman argued that neighborhood security guards needed "walkies-talkies, close-circuit cameras, electronic fences, bullet-proof glass, card-key systems", but no guns, adding "They are more of a threat to society by having a gun.".

Meanwhile, in a 1988 lecture at the Institute of Criminal Justice and Criminology of the University of Maryland, College Park, Lipman suggested private security firms should have access to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's criminal records to weed out felons and individuals with mental health problems.

Lipman's business increased in the wake of the 1995 Oklahoma city bombing.

On September 11, 2001, Lipman instructed his employees to evacuate floors 48th to 52nd of the One Liberty Plaza, adjacent to the World Trade Center.

Within a year, Lipman supported the Private Security Officer Employment Standards Act, a 2002 bill proposed by Senator Carl Levin of Michigan.

Don Walker, the chairman and CEO of Pinkerton and chair of the American Society for Industrial Security, suggested Lipman had worked with Levin in "a cloud of secrecy".

In 2004, Lipman's opinion pieces published in The New York Times as early as 1980 were discussed by the United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security and Investigations.

By 2014, the company had an annual revenue of US$500 million, with 17,000 employees.

It had "130 offices in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico and the United Kingdom."

In 2015, he sold Guardsmark to Universal Protection Service, the largest private security company in the United States, and he served as its vice chairman until its 2016 merger with AlliedBarton.

He was called "a pioneer in the private security guard business".

His work was cited by the United States Department of Justice's Law Enforcement Assistance Administration and the United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security and Investigations.

He supported the arts in Memphis, Tennessee, and Judeo-Christian interfaith dialogue in the United States.