Call off the The Great Mouse Detective! The State Fair Crime of the Century has been solved!
Earlier this week, we – along with every other click-starved, pageview-chasing media outlet in town – shared a video of some drifter doing his best Jafar impression, trying to swipe Disney on Ice wigs like they were Aladdin's lamp.
Thanks to the publicity the crime generated – and an overzealous OKCPD gumshoe who probably wanted free Oklahoma State Fair tickets – we’re happy to report the case has been solved, the suspect has been nabbed, and the wigs – which have hopefully been dry cleaned and tested for fentanyl – are back on the heads of the princesses, fairies, and wicked stepmothers who wear them!
First, let’s meet the man behind the crime: Caleb Albers. He has a long criminal rap sheet on OSCN for crimes ranging from petty larceny to DUI to child abuse:
I don’t have a lot of sympathy for guys like Caleb. The fewer people like him on the streets, the better. But he was obviously way too high or hungover to realize what he was stealing was valued at over $20,000...
Oklahoma City Police shared surveillance video on social media that they say was taken on September 7. It shows a man stuffing the stolen wigs into a backpack before taking off. Court documents say tips helped authorities identify the suspect as Caleb Albers, and that the wigs are valued at $20,000.
Hey, I think we all tend to overvalue things for insurance purposes, but $20,000 for a few wigs? That’s outrageous! You can get the same ones at Spirit Halloween for 20 bucks, and even that seems too high. Were these things made of real fairy hair? Were they spun overnight in a tower by Rumpelstiltskin? We need answers.
While we waited for those to come in, KFOR tracked down the woman who bought the wigs from Caleb. Her name is Marjorie Pfenning.
According to KFOR, Marjorie only paid $10 for the wigs, which seems a lot closer to their fair market value than $20,000:
"Pfenning said Albers came up to her outside her home, begging her to buy them.
'Told me he was hungry, and I told him I didn’t have much money on me,' said Pfenning.
Pfenning said Albers eventually convinced her to buy the wigs for $10.
'He didn’t tell me anything about where the wigs came from,' said Pfenning."
Whether it’s car speakers or fantasy wigs, I also probably wouldn’t ask too many questions when buying obviously-stolen merchandise from a drifter addict. The less we all know, the better, right?
Although she’s probably mad she didn’t know the real value of the wigs and could’ve flipped them for way more money on the underground Disney collectors' black market, Marjorie said all the right things:
"News 4 employees asked Pfenning if anything about the wigs stood out or raised red flags at the time. Pfenning said she wasn’t able to try them on before officers came to her door. She says they appeared to be too 'fantasy' and 'fairy tale' for her taste, so she had set them aside.
'I didn’t know there was a lot of money invested in the wigs, and I surely didn’t know they were from Disney on Ice. I would have returned the wigs immediately,' said Pfenning.
Pfenning says when she went to give the wigs to officers, she did, however, notice the wording on one of them that indicated it may be related to a Disney character.
'I noticed that the Tinkerbell wig had "Tink" underneath, on the underside of it.'"
Ugh. In my write-up about the heist, I speculated that the blonde wig with the bun belonged to Cinderella! I totally forgot about that pesky Tinkerbell! I guess it’s time to turn in, with shame and remorse, my Disney Dad card. I apologize to all of our loyal readers for getting it wrong and will try to do better next time.
Stay with The Lost Ogle. We’ll keep you advised.
