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Staff at King’s Supermarket called police after the accused thief tried buying the smokes with a revoked credit card Sunday afternoon. Officers William Diedtrich and Police Officer Jeff Angermeyer spotted the woman in the store parking lot and brought her to headquarters.
Police Chief Chip Stalter said 51-year-old Carlotta J. Alston of East Orange was carrying five of the victim’s cards, which she apparently lifted from the woman‘s purse at the Hillsdale Shop-Rite about a half-hour earlier.
“All the while, the victim was still shopping and unaware of the theft,” Stalter said.
Alston was just as clueless, the chief said: “The credit card company’s automatic fraud detection systems had already revoked the credit cards because of the unusual spike in usage in such a brief period of time.”
The officers then caught up to the victim and returned her cards, he said.
Alston was being held on $20,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail, charged with a variety of theft and fraud counts.
Meanwhile, Stalter warned residents that the indicent was “a valuable reminder that crimes of opportunity can occur anywhere and at anytime.”
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