Texas man gets 2 year prison sentence for stealing iPhones, Macs from Apple Stores

Apple Store Seoul (Image credit: Apple)

What you need to know

A Texas man will serve two years in prison for stealing products from Apple Stores.
He was responsible for 25 iPhones, MacBooks, and iPads going missing from the Little Rock Apple Store.

A 20-year-old Texas man is now serving three years in prison, two of which are because he stole a total of 25 iPhones, MacBooks, and iPads from the Little Rock Apple Store. Local reports also say that was part of a "multistate shoplifting ring" that targeted a range of Apple Stores.

Apparently unaware that items stolen from an Apple Store are almost impossible to use once deactivated remotely, the offender was joined by four other men who stole more than $26,000-worth of product. There is no information on which items in particular were stolen.

An arrest report states there were five men who stole 18 iPhones, six Macbooks and an iPad, valued at $26,445. The five grabbed the items and ran out. The other three defendants are awaiting trial on theft and commercial burglary charges.

This wasn't an isolated incident, with Apple saying that the men were part of a group that had been active in a number of areas.

Apple officials said the men were part of a group suspected of thefts in six Texas cities -- Dallas, Plano, Austin, Houston, Frisco and San Antonio -- as well as ones in Oklahoma City and Ridgeland, Miss., court filings show.

Once he's released from prison, the Texan will have to pay Apple back and serve a four-year suspended sentence, too.

Maybe he should check out our best iPhone deals instead of stealing them in the future.

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.