Free Republic

SALEM — Being in court can be stressful enough to give anyone what the old ads called an "Excedrin headache." But Joel Peralta's going to have to get his aspirin from the infirmary at Middleton Jail for a while, after allegedly stealing $75 worth of the painkiller — while on a break from a court appearance on earlier shoplifting charges. Peralta, 33, of Lynn, was in Salem District Court Thursday morning on charges stemming from the theft of $155 worth of baby formula from the Shaw's supermarket in Salem. As often happens with misdemeanors, he met directly with a prosecutor...

Dayton, OH (AHN) - Employees of a Dayton, Ohio store say a man stole several articles of clothing on Tuesday and then filled out a job application before leaving. Police arrested Stanley A. Wright, 49, on misdemeanor theft charges after workers at Deveroes said he stole T-shirts and pants, the Dayton Daily News reported. Wright stuffed the stolen items under his shirt and in the waistline of his pants before he made his way to the checkout counter to fill out a job application. As he left the store, the alarm went off. A manager discovered about $400 in apparel...

roanoke,va - WASHINGTON (AP) - Now it can be told: The mysterious petty theft that President Barack Obama’s new computer chief committed at age 21 was shoplifting four dress shirts worth $134 from J.C. Penney. A 1996 Montgomery County, Md., police report obtained by The Associated Press on Wednesday under a public records law shows Vivek Kundra was observed by a security guard putting the men’s shirts into a shopping bag and leaving the store without paying. Sgt. Tom Stanton wrote that Kundra was arrested after a brief foot chase and the property was recovered

> Police are using the car's license plate and a check the woman dropped to track her down.

A shoplifting dog leaves store employees scratching their heads. KSL's John Hollenhorst reports. (Video at link.)

<p>OKLAHOMA CITY — Authorities are trying to identify a young boy left inside a store by a suspected shoplifter who fled the store when confronted by a store security officer, police said Wednesday. The boy, who is about 2 or 3 years old, is apparently unable to identify himself, and no one has reported him missing, Sgt. Gary Knight said. The boy has been in Department of Human Services custody since Friday, when he was left inside the Wal-Mart store on west Reno. A man was pushing a shopping cart with the boy in it when security personnel spotted the man shoplifting and confronted him, Knight said. The man then fled the store, leaving the boy behind.</p>

  Did you see Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) suggest last week what her husband would have done if he had received the August 6, 2001, Presidential Daily Brief concerning bin Laden? Touching, wasn’t it? If only there was an ounce of truth to it.To refresh everyone’s memory, after former president Bill Clinton’s meltdown during an interview with Chris Wallace on September 24, the junior senator from New York felt compelled to come to his rescue: “I’m certain that if my husband and his national security team had been shown a classified report entitled `Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside United...

Wal-Mart refuses to carry smutty magazines. It will not sell compact discs with obscene lyrics. And when it catches customers shoplifting — even a pair of socks or a pack of cigarettes — it prosecutes them. Skip to next paragraph Paul Sakuma/Associated Press Customers outside a Wal-Mart store in Mountain View, Calif. But now, in a rare display of limited permissiveness, Wal-Mart is letting thieves off the hook — at least in cases involving $25 or less.

Rather than running away from the police, an alleged shoplifter ended up running into them — with grave results. Scott Everette Blake, 46, of Mounds View allegedly tried to steal more than $200 in men's accessories Saturday night from a Marshalls store near the Northtown shopping center in Blaine, said Anoka County Sheriff's Detective Jeff Rokeh. Store security guards watched as he removed watches, wallets and key chains from their packaging, bit off the security tags and stuffed the items in his pockets, Rokeh said. The guards called Blaine police and asked them to stand by as Blake prepared to...

A grand jury will decide if the retail giant was justified in acting against shoplifting suspectThe father of a shoplifting suspect who died while struggling with Wal-Mart employees wasn't shocked when officials ruled the death a homicide. Now, H.C. Driver and other family members are hoping that the people responsible for Stacy Clay Driver's death will be brought to justice. "Something like that isn't supposed to happen, especially in this country," the father said. "I have believed up to now in the justice system, and I hope it continues to work." Also, the Driver family has filed a lawsuit seeking...

MARIETTA, Ga. - A 72-year-old Wal-Mart greeter was seriously injured when he was run over while trying to stop a suspected shoplifter. The incident began Saturday afternoon when a security officer at the store saw a man stealing DVDs, Marietta police spokesman Brian Marshall said. When the security officer and the greeter, Lucief Zylanz, confronted the man at his car, the man's door hit Zylanz and knocked him down. The man then drove over Zylanz' leg, chest and head. Zylanz suffered a punctured lung, broken ribs and facial injuries. He was taken to Atlanta Medical Center and was listed in...

Michael Moore leaves no turn unstoned. There are multitudes of shattering, seminal moments in his brilliant Bush-whacking documentary, Fahrenheit 9/11, that reveal more about the cynicism, greed and ineptitude in the U.S. government than you will ever learn from any sound bite on the right-wing late-night cable-channel blabfests, but one will stay with me forever. Forget about the "official" reports from the White House about the activities of George W. Bush on the fateful morning of Sept. 11, insisting he learned about the Al Qaeda attacks while meeting with Florida pre-schoolers and quickly dashed from the room to save the...

The FBI's capture of a prominent figure in what it calls the nation's worst domestic terrorist threat may do little to slow the radical environmental movement known as the Earth Liberation Front, federal authorities acknowledge. The suspect, Tre Arrow, also known as Michael Scarpitti and numerous other pseudonyms, is a charismatic figure who has run for political office before running from the law after being accused as the ringleader in a pair of environmentally motivated arson attacks. "It's a very big capture for us," said Beth Anne Steele, spokeswoman for the Portland, Ore., office of the FBI. "[The suspect has]...

AP Special Correspondent   (enlarge photo) Actress Winona Ryder appears at Beverly Hills Superior Court April 7, 2003 in Beverly Hills, Calif. for a progress report following her conviction for shoplifting from Saks Fifth Avenue in Beverly Hills. Ryder was commended by a judge Monday, Dec.15, 2003, for abiding by the rules of her probation in a shoplifting case. (AP Photo/Mel Bouzad, Pool) BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. &mdash; Actress Winona Ryder was commended by a judge Monday for abiding by the rules of her probation in a shoplifting case.Ryder's lawyer, Shepard Kopp, said outside court that the judge plans to review...

SEDALIA, Mo. - A shoplifter caused a buzz in a department store restroom and made off with about $60 worth of CDs, perfume, batteries and scissors. The man released a swarm of honeybees in a Kmart restroom, creating a diversion that allowed him to escape, authorities said. Store security spotted the man shoplifting Monday and followed him to the restroom to confront him. When the worker opened the door, about 100 bees buzzed out. "He probably started yelling 'Bees! Bees!' or whatever the case may be, then created that big diversion, then got out," said police Cmdr. John DeGonia. Store...

L.A. Prosecutor: Winona Ryder Came to Steal Mon Oct 28, 4:03 PM ET By Jill Serjeant BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. (Reuters) - Actress Winona Ryder (news) went on her ill-fated shopping spree last December with intent to steal, even bringing scissors to clip security tags from purloined items and wads of tissue to conceal them, a prosecutor said at her shoplifting trial on Monday. Photo Reuters Photo Reuters Photo Reuters Slideshow Slideshow: Winona Ryder Ryder went to the posh Saks Fifth Avenue store in Beverly Hills with cash and a credit card, in addition to "her own two-for-one bonus program --...