Facebook Selfie Leads To Shoplifting Arrest Of 27-Year-Old Woman Wearing Stolen Dress


A Facebook selfie leads to the shoplifting arrest of a woman from West Frankfort, Illinois. Danielle Saxton, 27, helped police find a distinctive dress she allegedly stole from a boutique on July 11. When Saxton wanted to show off her new leopard-print dress, but clearly had no idea that the store — Morites Boutique — would post a message on their Facebook page describing the dress that was shoplifted.

Reuters reports that the store’s co-owner saw the woman take the dress and that’s how they knew right away it was missing.

Not long after the dress was shoplifted, it appeared on Facebook with Saxton wearing in. She captioned it, “Love my dress.”

Kert Williams, the boutique’s co-owner, heard back from someone within two hours who saw Saxton’s post. He called the police and says they “were on it in two seconds.”

Danielle was arrested and charged with theft and failure to appear in court based on a warrant from an unrelated case, West Frankfort Police Dispatch Supervisor John Hampton, said. He didn’t know what the charge was in the other case. Hampton did say that surveillance footage shows the theft in progress. He shares:

“The police knew who she was. She was arrested the same afternoon.”

ABC 3 WSIL has more on what the shop’s co-owner has to say about the Facebook selfie regarding the shoplifting arrest:

“What she stole was a very distinct leopard dress.”

The incident occurred last Friday and other items were also stolen from the store, not just the dress that the woman wore in her Facebook selfie.

“[She stole] A dress, a couple shirts, some jewelry, couple items like that,” Williams adds.

When Saxton was walking away from the store when Williams noticed her. He recalls:

“Her excuse was there was nobody in here. We were in the back working, and that she could just take it. You know, not really much of an excuse there.”

The store owner immediately checked security cameras and posted a message on Facebook about the stolen dress. Police Chief Shawn Talluto says:

“We just had a description and a direction of travel, but when the social media aspect played into it, we were able to identify who it was. And by looking at the background of the photograph we were able to pinpoint where she was at.”

When officers arrived to arrest Saxton, she still had the clothes in her hand, Talluto tells the news source.

Morties installed a security camera at the boutique a few months ago and it has more than paid for itself by catching shoplifters. Besides the latest Facebook selfie arrest of Danielle Saxton, three other female shoppes have been caught.

As for Saxton, she’s been released on bail.

[Image via In Flex We Trust]

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