A Summerfield woman was arrested for fraud after allegedly putting cheap clothing tags on expensive items to avoid paying full price at Walmart.
A deputy responded to Walmart, located at17961 S U.S. Hwy. 441, Summerfield at 8:30 p.m. Monday, according to an arrest report from the Marion County Sheriff’s Office. Upon arrival, he learned 38-year-old Sarah Elizabeth Robinson was suspected of ringing up merchandise with pricetags of much cheaper merchandise.
The deputy walked into the store to see a loss prevention employee talking to Robinson in the entryway. She was pushing a shopping cart with many bagged items inside. The employee advised that many of these items were scanned as other, much cheaper items, the report said.
The loss prevention associated took out a Hyper Tough saw, which costs about $70, and showed the deputy a $2.98 clothing tag that Robinson had attached and scanned instead. There were four to five more things which had cheaper clothing tags attached to them, as well. The deputy asked Robinson to show him the receipt, and she complied, the report said.
The items on the receipt came to $167.22. There was no saw, and many of the goods rang up under $3. Robinson subsequently admitted the loss prevention associate was correct about her putting a clothing tag on the saw and scanning that instead of its barcode, the report said.
The deputy had Robinson hand over the items in her hands so he could detain her in handcuffs, and she gave him all but one piece of paper. She frantically started crumbling it up in her hand, but the deputy opened her hand to see it was another clothing tag. She ultimately admitted attaching the clothing tags to avoid paying full prices, which a friend told her how to do, the report said.
The employee later came back with the actual total of merchandise in her cart, which came to $259.06. She tried to avoid paying a $91.84 discrepancy, the report said.
A criminal history check revealed Robinson was currently out on bond for an arrest on Sept. 14. She had been charged with possession of fentanyl, failure to register motor vehicle and no valid license, the report said.
For this incident, she was charged with scheme to defraud (less than $20,000). The Ohio native was transported to Marion County Jail to be held without bond.