Jury Finds District Woman Guilty of Felony-Enhanced Theft of Over $700 from Target in Columbia Heights

WASHINGTON – Meredith Wilson, 52, of the District, was found guilty on May 14, 2025, by a Superior Court jury of second degree, in the first jury trial in more than a decade in the District for a count of felony-enhanced second-degree theft, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro and Chief Pamela Smith of the Metropolitan Police Department.

The charge carries a one-year mandatory minimum sentence of incarceration. Superior Court Judge Andrea Hertzfeld scheduled sentencing for July 15, 2025.

According to the evidence, on June 27, Wilson stole more than $700 of jewelry, handbags, and household goods from the Target store in Columbia Heights.

Under the laws of the District of Columbia, a person convicted of theft in the first or second degree who has two or more prior convictions for theft can be prosecuted for felony-enhanced theft. Felony-enhanced theft carries with it a mandatory-minimum term of not less than one year of incarceration upon conviction. Wilson had previously pleaded guilty to second-degree theft on two prior occasions, including in 2017 and 2018 in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. Wilson’s two prior convictions for theft met the predicate for the felony-enhanced theft charge under which Wilson was convicted in the instant case.

The case was investigated by the Metropolitan Police Department. It was prosecuted and tried by Assistant United States Attorneys Jason B.A. McCullough and Maggie E. Sullivan.