Court records: Orangeburg County woman gets $14k after false arrest

ORANGEBURG COUNTY, S.C. (WCSC) - An Orangeburg County woman received a $14,000 payment after she says she was falsely arrested, court records state.

According to a lawsuit, about four years ago, Afreida Parker was shopping at her neighborhood grocery store when an off duty police officer spotted another woman in the parking lot removing packages of meat from her clothes and placing them in her vehicle.

The suit states that the officer then requested that police be dispatched to the grocery store parking lot in response to the suspected shoplifting. In the meantime, after finishing her shopping, Parker said she packed her groceries in her car and drove off.

That’s when she says Orangeburg police pulled her over and asked for a receipt for her groceries, court records state. She says she showed them the receipt, and after searching her shopping bags, the officers confirmed that all the groceries in Parker’s car had been paid for.

At the same time Parker was pulled over, the lawsuit states officers also stopped the other woman who confessed to shoplifting, and in fact, the lawsuit states they found the stolen articles in the other woman’s car. Parker then says she spoke with one or more of the grocery store’s employees, and despite all the evidence that she paid for everything, she was handcuffed, arrested and taken to jail where she remained for about 24 hours.

Later, after looking at all the facts, the lawsuit states the prosecutor for the city of Orangeburg dismissed the shoplifting charge against Parker. Last month, almost four years after she was first arrested, she was awarded $14,000 in a settlement.