The face of the REAL Hamburgler!

[Blue-Jay]

For the better part of a decade, Grady E. Shanklin of East St. Louis has bedeviled police in his hometown with an alleged series of thefts, mostly of hams.

Shanklin, 45, has been arrested 10 times since 1998 on charges of retail theft. Four of those arrests, including the most recent on April 28, were on charges of stealing hams from the Schnucks store at 2511 State Street in East St. Louis.

Like a lot of alleged thieves, police said, Shanklin has established certain patterns. He favors smoked, boneless hams and, according to police reports, always takes two at a time.

Often, he tries to conceal them beneath a large raincoat, police said, though on April 28 he allegedly walked into the store with two empty Schnucks shopping bags and was caught on a surveillance camera putting the hams in the bags along with a six-pack of Colt 45 beer.

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