A frequent Athens shoplifter once known as the Piggly Wiggly bacon thief may be going back to prison because she stole a water faucet from a local home improvement center a few months ago.

Lonneshia Shafaye Appling was well known in law enforcement circles for her penchant for shopping at stores without paying, but she earned public notoriety May 2013 when, at the former Piggly Wiggly supermarket on Lexington Road, she was caught trying to steal beer, five packs of cheese, five packs of bacon and two packs of chicken wings.

A fracas ensued when employees confronted Appling as she was leaving the store, and she wielded a can of pepper spray and discharged it into the face of one employee. Appling then punched and pepper sprayed a second employee, Athens-Clarke police said.

After she targeted those employees, police said, Appling then dispersed pepper spray all around her and ran out a side door.

As employees chased the 340-pound woman outside, they saw Appling drop cans of beer from her purse, police said. When they caught up with the woman and spoke with her in an attempt to detain her for police, Appling punched one of the workers, and then spit in his face.

While fleeing, Appling even offered the employees money if they would stop following her, but they remained with her until officers arrived and arrested her, according to police.

Appling was charged with felony theft by shoplifting not because of the value of the items she tried to steal — $88.27 — but because she had a long history of shoplifting arrests, with six prior convictions in Athens-Clarke and Oconee counties since 2006.

While the scene at Piggly Wiggly had been chaotic, Appling had created public spectacles before.

In one instance, a deputy tried to arrest her in January 2012 for shoplifting at Ingles in Madison County. While the deputy placed handcuffs on Appling, she started taking her clothes off and said she had AIDS, authorities said. After Appling removed all of her clothes, she tried to flee, but the deputy subdued her with a stun gun.

Soon after being taken into custody for the Piggly Wiggly incident, Appling asked the arresting officer to write his report in a way that it would be "more interesting so that her arrest would make the police blotter" in the local newspaper.

For the Piggly Wiggly incident, Appling struck a plea bargain in which she was given a 10-year sentence, with the first five years to be served in confinement. However, a Georgia Department of Corrections spokeswoman on Wednesday said Appling was released on parole in 2014.

There are no court records in Athens-Clarke County indicating any additional arrests subsequent to Appling being granted parole.

However, in a police report dated Nov. 23, 2016, a detective documented a meeting he had with the loss prevention manager for Lowes on Lexington Road in which evidence was presented concerning Appling committing a theft from the store in October.

According to the report, Appling entered the store and immediately headed to the plumbing department where she selected s $200 faucet and then left without paying for the item. Police said Appling soon reentered the store and tried to get a cash refund for the faucet, but was denied due to her name being flagged for previous fraudulent merchandise returns, according to police.

A felony theft by shoplifting warrant was subsequently obtained, and when Appling was arrested Tuesday afternoon she was additionally charged with a parole violation.

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