Man Faces 30 Years For Doughnut Theft

(AP)  A Missouri man could potentially face a 30-year prison sentence for stealing a doughnut from a store.

Scott A. Masters, 41, of Park Hills, Missouri, has been charged with felony second-degree robbery in the theft of a 52-cent doughnut from a Country Mart in Farmington, about 70 miles south of St. Louis. Store employees said he slipped the doughnut into his sweat shirt without paying last December, then pushed away a clerk who tried to stop him as he fled the store.

The push is being treated as minor assault, which transforms a misdemeanor shoplifting charge into a strong-armed robbery with a potential prison term of five to 15 years. Given Masters' past criminal record, prosecutors could boost that sentence to 30 years to life.

"Strong-arm robbery? Over a doughnut? That's impossible," Masters told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper from jail. He admitted that he took the pastry but denied touching the female employee. "I've never had a violent crime in my life. And there's no way I would've pushed a woman over a doughnut."

Farmington Police Chief Rick Baker said state law treats the shoplifting and assault as forcibly stealing property. The amount of force and value of the property does not matter.

"It's not the doughnut," Baker said. "It's the assault."

Masters, who has been arrested more than a dozen times for crimes ranging from shoplifting to drug possession to torching a car for insurance fraud, said he forgot about the doughnut theft as he spent the summer in jail on outstanding warrants.

He was indicted Sept. 14 for the robbery and is being held on $25,000 bail after having his case continued on Friday. With two prior felony convictions, Masters could face a long prison sentence if found guilty because prosecutors could pursue an enhanced sentence.

County Prosecutor Wendy Wexler Horn said it was "way too early to know how it is going to play out," but that the charge seemed appropriate given the store employees' allegations. She acknowledged some are questioning the seriousness of the charge.

"People are missing the point," Horn said. "It is not about the doughnut."

For Masters' part, he did not even get to enjoy his ill-gotten gains. He said he threw the doughnut away as he fled.

[Krazcarl]

random-radar...THanks for the voice of reason.

[philbyaustx]

How much will it cost taxpayers to imprison a man for theft of a 52 cent doughnut for a year?, 30 years?, life? As for the clerk who got pushed, who would take any risk for 52 cents? Draw the line somewhere else.

[michellem99-2009]

People yer don''t know MO and they will bar yer from store/call the cops over a candy bar. So when We lived there I had to keep change in my purse so my diabetes room mate could have a candy bar or OJ. And pay for it. A donugnut that was not his. It was the store''s. It yers when yer buy and pay for it.

[kaminishiki]

"Erinye_fury" is absolutely correct. Yesterday I saw an interview on TV with a guy whose name rang a strange bell...Michael Milken. What confused me was his supposed leadership in some medical research foundation. Was this the same guy from the past, I wondered? So I looked him up at: wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Milken. Guess what. Same criminal. Now number 458 on the Billionaire'' list. Now being praised. Unbelievable.

So there you have it. Proof positive. Point nailed. The ruling elite get away with vast crimes of ungodly proportions, and some guy who steals a doughnut and knocks somebody a bit getting away faces life in prison. Justice in this country is blind, dumb and usually racist.

So all you authoritarians out there who can''t wait to put the trash in the slammer over a doughnut, please enter here your outrage over a man who stole BILLIONS, has 99 indictments, who hires the world''s best attorneys and has friends in powerful places and who gets out of jail in under two years and then touted on TV years later as a philanthropist!!!!

And you folks want to fry a doughnut thief. Give me a break...Totally NUTS.

[killtheliars]

I heard it was Homer Simpson

[consciousnes]

Sorry about that, "doesn''t belong to you"

[consciousnes]

I say GOOD ! ! ! It''s about time that people get the message that you just can''t take something that belongs to you. He should just be thankful that he doesn''t life in Iran, he could loose a hand.

[vancouverboo]

How about a politically correct march for the Farmington 1? What''s that you say? Oh, I see, well, then forget it.

[nolalou]

Like the doughnut in question, this case is full of holes!

The ironic part is if he is sentenced to years in jail, he''ll problably end up eating dozens of doughnuts at taxpayers expense!

[sharncedar]

Well, we have 2.5 million of neo-capitalism''s "losers" in prison now. Our prison population is larger than many countries, its larger than the whole population of the original 13 colonies. but anything so that Jack Welch and Greenspawn can keep banging our young women, I guess you have to put all the young men in prison. Hooray for neo-capitalism.