New Canaan Woman Accused of Stealing Caviar, Cheese

A 56-year-old New Canaan woman faces a misdemeanor charge after surveillance cameras at a local grocery story caught her shoplifting a $16.99 cheese, police said.

The incident follows an earlier theft of a $125 jar of caviar from the same shop, also caught on video, though the store is not bringing charges in that case, police said.

Serena Benenson of Richmond Hill Road was charged with sixth-degree larceny and scheduled to appear Jan. 31 in state Superior Court in Norwalk.

A manager at Walter Stewart’s Market told police on Jan. 25 that the shop was tracking a woman who about three months earlier had been caught stealing the caviar. Stewart’s did not pursue that theft with police, but kept an eye out for the woman, later identified as Benenson, police said. They knew who Benenson was because she had a shopper’s card with the store, according to Sgt. Carol Ogrinc of the New Canaan Police Department.

On Jan. 25, she came back and took an expensive soft cheese—Brillat-Savarin Bloomy Rind French cheese. According to Artisanal Premium Cheese, that’s a “cow's milk, triple-crème brie-style cheese from France.”

“It is buttery, rich, creamy and decadent with a thin natural skin,” the organization’s website says.

After Benenson had left Stewart’s on Jan. 25, the manager checked the cheese area and saw a missing item that didn’t match up with what was supposed to be in stock. Prompted by this, the manager checked the surveillance video and saw Benenson remove the cheese from a box and put the empty box back, police said.

According to Ogrinc, Benenson admitted that she had made a bad decision when police later confronted her at home.