A Pinellas County Sheriff’s detective arrested a sex offender who was shoplifting in Dunedin Publix while wearing a deputy sheriff’s star. The 43-year-old Clearwater resident was stealing Halloween candy and kid’s sticker books while wearing a sheriff’s shield on his waistband. He was spotted at the Publix Supermarket by a member of the sexual predator and offender tracking unit.
The suspect exited the Publix and made his way to a car often driven by law enforcement, a Ford Crown Victoria. Authorities searched the car and found a pellet gun that looked like a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun. Also found in the car was an electric stun gun. The man was arrested in Pinellas on charges of shoplifting and unlawful use of a police badge.

According to TBO.com he was also wanted on a Polk County arrest warrant for two violations. The first was failure to appear on charges of driving with a revoked or suspended driver’s license. The second was a failure to appear on charges of possession of a firearm.
Impersonating a police officer was one of the charges the suspect was convicted of in South Carolina in 1992. Along with that charge he was convicted of criminal sexual conduct, kidnapping and unlawful possession of a firearm. The pattern was enough to raise suspicion in his recent arrest, which seemed to mirror what he was convicted of almost 20 years ago. Detective Grubb was off-duty at the time he spotted the man in Publix.
There was no further information on which county jail the convicted sex offender was being held or if he was able to post bail or bond. The only information contained in the on-line story about the arrestee was that he lives in a Clearwater apartment