Jury Finds Winona Ryder Guilty of Theft

Actress Winona Ryder was convicted of shoplifting more than £4,000 worth of clothes at a Beverly Hills court yesterday. The twice-Oscar nominated actress is unlikely to face jail time and will probably receive probation or community service, when she appears for sentencing next month.

Ryder showed no emotion, sipping from a bottle of water, after the clerk of the court read the verdict. She was cleared of a charge of burglary, as the jury gave her the benefit of the doubt on a charge which involves using an implement to carry out the offence. But she was found guilty of two charges of grand theft and vandalism.

The jury had deliberated for five and a half hours before reaching their verdicts.

Ryder, whose films include Girl, Interrupted, Beetlejuice, Little Women, The Age of Innocence and the recent Mr Deeds, was arrested at the Beverly Hills branch of Saks Fifth Avenue on December 12 last year. She was stopped by security staff and accused of stealing $5,560 worth of merchandise from the store.

The case against her was that she had been seen picking up 20 items as she moved through the store but had only paid for four of them. Store detectives said that they had seen her cutting off the security tags from items while she was in a changing room. She was accused of having brought scissors to the store in order to clip off the tags.

When apprehended, according to Saks security manager, Ken Evans, Ryder had claimed that she was rehearsing for a film. "She said, 'I'm sorry for what I did,'" Mr Evans told the court. "'My director directed me to shoplift for a role which I was preparing.'" She told another security officer that she thought she had left her credit card with an assistant earlier in the day and told her to leave it open.

The actress, who turned 31 during the trial and who makes $6m a film, did not give evidence although her lawyer, Mark Geragos, said that she wanted to. Mr Geragos claimed that the security staff had wanted to "nail" her because she was a celebrity and had tailored their evidence to ensure a conviction. He produced one witness, Michael Shoar, a former Saks employee who claimed that Mr Evans had told him he wanted to see the "rich Beverly Hills bitch" punished.

There was controversy over the fact that Ryder faced such serious charges since shoplifting is normally dealt with as a misdemeanour if it is a first offence. One suggestion is that the prosecution wanted to make an example of her as previous district attorneys in LA have been accused of treating celebrities too generously.

Ryder's parents, Mike and Cindy Horowitz, who live in Northern California, were in court during her trial. Fans wore "Free Winona" T-shirts. She herself wore the T-shirt as an illustration for a magazine interview in the summer.

The trial was a bad-tempered affair with Mr Geragos being frequently scolded by the judge, Elden Fox. Mr Geragos accused the Saks security team of lying for their "15 minutes of fame" and said that the actress had always intended to paid for the clothes.

More than 40 television crews and dozens of journalists attended the trial. The verdict pushed the mid-term election results and an alleged al-Qaida/Colombian drugs plot off the top of the news bulletins.

Prosecutor Ann Rundle told the jury that Ryder may have shoplifted for a thrill and that claiming that she was preparing for a part was no defence. She cited the character that Ryder plays in Girl, Interrupted who liked to shoplift for thrills. She claimed that the defence version of events could only have been written in Hollywood.