At about 8:08pm Wednesday, Turlock Police responded to a shoplifting in progress at Famous Footwear in the 2800 block of W. Monte Vista Avenue.

The caller reported a man had exited the store with two bags of merchandise and had been last seen going behind the business.

Officer Kauffman arrived on scene and was flagged down by security, stating the man had walked across the street, possibly to Yogolicious.

Officer Arroyo contacted a man at Yogolicious who matched the description, other than a different shirt which he admitted to changing.

The man, later identified as Joshua Slyter, 34, of Merced, identified himself as his brother. His lie was quickly discovered due to his descriptors, photo, and tattoo information not matching up.

Even after being confronted about it, Slyter stuck to identifying himself as his brother and was given several chances of getting out of a felony, despite having been previously arrested for the same felony less than a year ago.

Slyter’s true identity was eventually discovered and he turned out to have two warrants out of Merced County. The first was a no-bail for violation of probation, while the second was a $5,000 misdemeanor for falsely identifying to a peace officer.

Slyter was again confronted, this time with his real name, yet continued to lie until being shown his booking photo.

An in-field show-up was conducted where Slyter was positively identified as the suspect. The stolen property was also recovered and returned to the business.

Slyter was arrested and booked into the Stanislaus County Public Safety Center on charges of false personation, theft, and his warrants.