A 56-year-old Chinese national was detained after returning to Singapore for allegedly shoplifting at Changi Airport on February 17.
An employee of a retail store in the Terminal 4 transit area saw a S$716 purse missing from the display shelf on January 7, which prompted the police to become involved in the case.
The suspect allegedly put the handbag on her luggage cart after entering the store and then left without paying, according to surveillance footage.
The police said that the woman's name was subsequently established, but by then she had already left Singapore.
On February 17, over a month later, she arrived back in Singapore and was immediately taken into custody at Changi Airport.
According to the police, she will face charges of stealing in a dwelling on February 27 in court. She faces a maximum sentence of seven years in prison, a fine, or both if convicted.
Assistant Commissioner of Police M Malathi, who is the Commander of Airport Police Division, told The Straits Times: "The police take a serious view of shop theft cases."
"This case reiterated our point that with more widespread adoption of closed-circuit television technology by retailers, shop theft cases that might have gone unnoticed at the time of the incident would eventually be detected," he added.
A similar incident had also happened in January, when a male Indian national was accused of stealing something from a store in Terminal 2's transit area prior to boarding his aircraft. A few days later, he returned to Singapore and was arrested.
