Three Woman Accused Of Stealing From Multiple Stores At Aventura Mall

Three women are accused of stealing more than $2,500 worth of merchandise from stores at the Aventura Mall.

Altoneka Bush, 27, Dontoria Bennett, 22, and Lakeria Dennard, 22, were captured on surveillance cameras concealing merchandise at a Victoria's Secret PINK store Wednesday, an arrest report claims. 

(L-R) Bush, Bennett, Dennard

The women allegedly went to the register with items they claimed to have entered the store but did not have a receipt and wanted a cash refund.

Police said the cashier refused to give them cash back, so the women became loud and started to claim employees were being racist toward them.

The store manager eventually gave the women the cash to avoid any additional issues, authorities said.

According to the arrest report, the trio left the store with the cash and were seen entering a silver Saturn outside the mall; they stayed there for several minutes before returning to the mall. 

Police said the thieves went to Urban Outfitters, where they purchased a couple items.

While leaving the store, the shoplifting sensor alarms went off, at which time one of the suspects who had purchased items stopped and went to a nearby employee to show her the merchandise, while the other two suspects continued to walk out the store with concealed merchandise, authorities said.

The trio left the mall in the Saturn, but were stopped by Aventura police officers who had been monitoring the women.

The thieves were still in the process of pulling stolen merchandise out of their pants as officers were conducting the traffic stop, authorities said. 

Police said more than $1,500 worth of stolen merchandise from PINK was recovered and more than $1,000 worth of merchandise from Urban Outfitters was recovered.

According to the arrest report, officers also found Dennard and Bennett each in possession of a counterfeit Green Dot card.

Two Florida driver's licenses belonging to other women were also found in Bennett's wallet, the report stated.

Police are investigating to determine whether the IDs were used to conduct the fraudulent refunds.

The suspects were arrested on charges of grand theft and dealing in stolen property. Dennard and Bennett also face charges of forgery of a credit card. They were all issued trespass orders from the Aventura Mall for three years. 


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