Crisis Center and Crime

 

Man steals donation jar intended for Pregnancy Care Center, is “so embarrassed” when scene is shown on TV he turns himself in

By Dave Andrusko
Many of the best stories we post on NRL News Today come from information provided by our readers, in this case from someone directly involved with the Pregnancy Care Center in Jonesboro, Georgia.

Fairburn, Georgia, police described it as a first. A man was caught on the surveillance camera “swiping a donation jar right off a convenience store counter” at the Fairburn Travel Center. Tuesday night the local Fox 5 station aired the footage.

Fox 5 reporter Denise Dillon told her viewers that what was caught on the video was “crystal-clear.” A man “is shown snatching the donation jar, shaped like a blue baby bottle complete with a ribbon, because the money was to go to a pregnancy center”—the Pregnancy Care Center.

Police hoped that someone would recognize the guy but instead it was the man who turned himself in. After seeing his face on TV Darrean Butler picked up the phone, Dillon reported. He told police “he was so embarrassed he wanted to surrender.”

Not perhaps as strange as it sounds. “When your name and your face[are] posted for the world to see, that’s something that has a powerful effect on people,” said Sgt. Anthony Bazydlo, “which I think ultimately is what drove him to give us a call and turn himself in.”
Why did he do it? According to police, he didn’t go into the convenience center intending to steal anything. He told them he was down on his luck and needed the money. “He said it wasn’t something he planned on. He wanted in, saw the jar, saw an opportunity,” Bazydlo said.

Local residents, who were outraged by the theft, were not as forgiving as the police, at least not the two interviewed by Fox. But because Butler turned himself in, Dillon reported, “They [the police] were a little bit lenient on him and basically allowed him to sign his own bond.”
His court date is set for February.

Source: NRLC News