By Shavonne Walker

shavonne.walker@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY — A Rockwell woman was charged with damaging property in Walmart and leaving blood behind after she tried to cut an anti-theft device off a television inside the store.

Salisbury Police charged Barbara Upright Link, 58, of the 11700 block of Old Beatty Ford Road, with injury to personal property and second-degree trespass, both misdemeanors.

Police received a call from the store’s loss prevention officer who’d spotted a skinny older white woman wearing shorts who’d been banned from the store previously walking through the store. She was using a Pioneer Woman paring knife that she got from the store to remove the anti-theft devices from large televisions in the electronics section, said Capt. Melonie Thompson.

She tried to put the knife in her waistband, but it fell through her shorts and she kicked it underneath a shelf. She told a store employee she wanted to see if the TV fit in her car. The employee told her she could not let her put the TV in her car.

She left the electronics section after getting blood on three television boxes. She put two vacuums in her cart, a TV wall mount, and a case of beer. The woman tried to go through the self check out, but a store employee told her she could not buy the beer since she was intoxicated.

Link walked out of the store without the items and headed across the street to Murphy’s Express and was charged because she bled on three TVs — two 50-inch and one 39-inch — and two vacuum cleaners.

She was given a citation for the offenses. Police said the last time Link was in Walmart was March when she was charged with trying to remove an anti-theft device.