Drexel graduate and convicted identity thief Jocelyn Kirsch was in the news again after being fired from her short stint as a cashier at a California clothing store while finishing her prison sentence.
Kirsch, the Bonnie of the “Bonnie and Clyde” duo that was sentenced to five years in prison in Nov. 2008, is now on supervised release. 2005 College graduate Edward Anderton, the Clyde of the duo, is also on supervised release. He received four years in prison. The twosome made a splash four years ago after committing identity theft and making $119,000 off the scheme.
“They were lucky. They should’ve gotten more time in prison,” said Mark Hauser, a Philadelphia-based attorney unrelated to the case.
Hauser explained that Kirsch received a longer sentence because she committed a crime after her arrest. As for the shortened prison sentence, he said since they were sentenced in federal court, the federal guidelines only suggest they serve 75 to 80 percent of their time in prison. If Kirsch served the year between her arrest and her conviction in prison, he said, then it’s reasonable that she’d already be released.
After numerous customers voiced their concerns about having a former identity thief and prisoner as their cashier, Kirsch was fired from her job.
Daniel Filler, a Drexel University law professor, commented that the crimes were unexpected because the two were attractive, affluent and from prestigious schools. “It was a sexy, People magazine man-bites-dog story,” he said.
But it wasn’t the sum of money alone that made their story unusual. Kirsch and Anderton had keys to 40 different apartments. They used these keys to trespass into people’s homes and steal their credit card information and data from their personal computers.
Filler commented that although this is an unusual job for Kirsch to take considering her criminal history, he does not believe the law regulates whether she can work as a cashier. He added that the only job he could think of that would be more unusual for Kirsch than cashier is police detective.
Filler believes they were able to get away with these crimes because they were young and seemed innocent. No one suspected people like them could commit such high-profile crimes.
The likelihood of repeat offenses from Kirsch and Anderton after their release is unclear. “Most people don’t repeat their crimes,” he said, but the probability is “very individual.” He also added that Kirsch and Anderton probably received a lot of “push back” from friends and family.
“They’re probably less likely to repeat than drug dealers,” said Hauser, although he’s unsure about the recidivism rate for this kind of crime.
“But who knows?” Filler continued. “It took a lot of gumption to do what they did.”
Filler concluded that he wouldn’t be surprised if we heard of Bonnie and Clyde again.
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