Man wanted for cross-country retail theft operation at Home Depots arrested in Pittsburgh area
BEN AVON HEIGHTS, Pa. (KDKA) — A man wanted for a cross-country retail theft operation was arrested in Ohio Township.
The call went out, and the Ohio Township Police Department answered.
"They shared images of the vehicle of the suspect who had yet to be formally identified and asked us to be on the lookout for him," said Ohio Township Detective D. Ryan Ging. "They thought he was moving this way based on his pattern and movement."
An Ohio Township officer cruised through The Home Depot in Ben Avon Heights, and as luck would have it, he spotted the suspect's vehicle.
"He saw the defendant, Antonio Bryant, coming back to his vehicle. Ironically enough after committing another theft," Ging said.
Bryant, who is from Georgia, is now accused of stealing thousands of dollars from countless Home Depots across the nation.
"A lot of times, he would go to self-checkout and he would take smoke detectors, CO detectors or GFCI outlets and he would just under-ring them," Ging said. "He would switch the SKU codes so it would ring up as something pennies on the dollar."
Police believe Bryant would then drive to another Home Depot, return all of it and convert it to cash.
"We didn't find any reason ... to logically explain why he was doing this," Ging said. "We almost suspect it could be just the thrill."
Cranberry police and several other Pittsburgh-area police departments plan to also file charges against Bryant.
Police said they believe he was involved in similar thefts in Texas, Missouri, Kansas, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana. He is in the Allegheny County Jail.
