An attorney with the state Department of Law faces a felony theft charge for shoplifting shoes from a Fred Meyer store in late December, according to police in a criminal complaint filed Jan. 20.
The Law Department confirmed state labor attorney Erin Pohland, 31, is the woman charged. Department spokesman Bill McAllister said her current work status and other personnel information is confidential.
Fred Meyer surveillance footage Dec. 30 showed Pohland and another woman, 30-year-old Skye McRoberts, each with her own cart, putting $1,020.08 worth of shoes in the carts, according to the complaint. They concealed the shoes in shopping bags and cut off electronic theft-prevention tags in another part of the store, the complaint said.
McRoberts ended up with all the shoes and pushed a cart past the checkout lanes and out the door without paying, said a Fred Meyer employee, Trevor Young, who contacted police.
Loss-prevention guards stopped McRoberts, and police charged her with theft. Guards thought the other woman's name was Erin, but McRoberts wouldn't tell them her accomplice's name, police said.
On Jan. 19, a detective was preparing for a monthly meeting between loss-prevention guards and police when an Anchorage Police Department clerk thought she recognized Pohland in a picture from Fred Meyer surveillance cameras, police said. A little later, the clerk and a juvenile justice officer who also recognized Pohland confirmed it was her, the affidavit shows.
Young, the loss-prevention guard, told police Pohland seemed to be the main person concealing the shoes and cutting off the electronic tags. Young also said the women had taken the shoes to the store's hardware section, where they used wire cutters to remove the tags. They then put the empty boxes back, he said.
By CASEY GROVE
casey.grove@adn.com