A criminologist dubbed "the UK's poshest thief" by tabloids has avoided jail time for a shopping spree that included stealing wine, steaks, and Le Creuset cookware. Pauline Al Said, a 35-year-old former criminology lecturer at the University of Bath, was fined just over $2,000 for the thefts from a garden center and a branch of Marks & Spencer, the Times of London reports. Her husband, Mark Wheatcroft, was fined $1,350 for theft and the assault of a worker at the garden center. Prosecutors said Wheatcroft, 56, threatened to punch a security officer who stopped him and "made contact" with the man's back. Al Said and Wheatcroft were found guilty last year.
A jury heard that Al Said used a device to remove security tags and tried to leave the garden center in West Sussex with the cookware and alcohol including gin and spiced rum, the Guardian reports. In the second incident, Al Said tried to steal more than 30 steaks and nine bottles of wine from a Marks & Spencer in Winchester. Keith Cutler, the sentencing judge, said he decided to fine Al Said after concluding that she would not comply with a community service order. The couple, representing themselves at the hearing, argued that their offenses were at the "lower end" of the scale. The Times reports that they were not ordered to pay trial costs because the prosecution's lawyer didn't show up at the hearing. (More United Kingdom stories.)
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