Inside Doris Payne's six-decade career of crime
It was at a Cleveland, Ohio jewelry store in the 1940s that Doris Payne’s eyes were opened to the magic of distraction.
She had gone in with a five dollar bill her mother gave her to settle the family's balance. Doris told the store owner, Mr Bill Benjamin, that her mother had promised to buy her a watch if she kept her grades up.
As Mr Benjamin helped her try on a few watches, a white man came into the store. Mr Benjamin’s demeanor immediately changed, Doris said, and he quickly ushered her away. He had always been friendly to Ms Payne - so she was shocked that he clearly didn’t want to be seen being nice to a young black girl.
It was only when she reached the door that she realized she still had one of Mr Benjamin’s watches on. She gave it back to him, but a realization stuck in her mind.
Commotion, and emotion, lead people to forget.
Life-long jewelry thief Doris Payne is notorious for swiping more than $2 million in goods from all around the world over the last 60 years. She's pictured here in mugshots taken in May (left) and June (right) of 1965 when she was 35 years old
Despite being arrested and jailed numerous times for her crimes, Doris hasn't slowed down. She is pictured in a prison jumpsuit at a court hearing in Indio, California in 2013 during which she was accused of stealing a $22,000 diamond ring
In the 70 years that followed, Doris Payne grew to become one of the world’s most prolific and simultaneously discreet jewel thieves – traveling from New York, Miami, Paris, Monte Carlo and Tokyo to pursue her infamous career.
She estimates that she’s swiped more than $2 million in precious jewels in that time, and authorities believe she’s accrued more than five social security numbers, nine dates of birth, and 22 aliases over the years, including Audrey Davis, Thelma White, Sonya Dowels, Marie Clements, and Donna Gilbert, according to The Associated Press.
Her story is a complex one, and divisive among those who have followed it. For some, it is black and white – she broke the law, therefore she is a common criminal. Others take her story into account: the child of an abusive father who did what she needed to escape her rural West Virginian home.
Whatever lens her life is viewed through, it is nonetheless a tale of love, lies, and luxury.
Eunetta Boone, a film producer, journalist and author of the screenplay ‘Who is Doris Payne?’ told DailyMail.com: ‘Doris is living the American dream in the way she knew how. She was pursuing the American dream the way she knew how and with the skills she had.
‘At the end of the day she’s an all-American girl from West Virginia who found out what she was good at and used it to her advantage.’
The youngest of six children, Doris was born in Slab Fork, West Virginia in 1930. Her father was a coal miner who was illiterate and was said to have been abusive towards her mother, who worked as a seamstress
It was the desire to care for her mother financially and help her to leave the relationship that spurned her motivation to take expensive jewelry – and in most cases, pawn them for quick cash. She is seen in jail booking photos in California in 2013, left, and Atlanta in 2016, right
It was while Doris was in a Las Vegas penitentiary in 2006 that Eunetta Boone, working as a television producer, first met the thief for a story.
‘She was treated with a lot of respect in the penitentiary. People respected Doris. Which I find interesting. She’s very legendary,’ Ms Boone said.
Years later at the premiere of a documentary telling her story, ‘The Life and Crimes of Doris Payne,’ the two spoke again – the first time they’d interacted when Doris was a free woman.
‘I know her, and knew her,’ Ms Boone said. ‘But to see her in a different venue like that where she was the star of the moment was very interesting. In jail she was very much like she was at the end of the movie. Unapologetic, swagger, baddest b**** on the walk. But to be honest, in person, she was like your great aunt or your grandmother. Sweet, stylish, but careful.’
Perhaps the motivation for her proclivity for the high life, Ms Payne was born into an extremely humble household.
‘She was a girl who grew up fantasizing about being fabulous,’ Ms Boone said.
The youngest of six children, she was born in Slab Fork, West Virginia in 1930. Her father was a coal miner who was illiterate and was said to have been abusive towards her mother, who worked as a seamstress.
It was the desire to care for her mother financially and help her to leave the relationship that spurned her motivation to take expensive jewelry – and in most cases, pawn them for quick cash.
‘She was the child who endured abuse, who saw her mom and her dad – she loved them both really – but understood they were victims of the locale and of the expectations that were set before them, which is to live in this town and make the best of it and live. Survive,’ Ms Boone continued.
Ms Payne also needed a means of support for herself and her child. At the age of 18, she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. Later on in life, she had a daughter and another son. All three were sporadically taken from her due to her arrests throughout the years, Ms Boone said.
After her first interaction with blatant racism in Mr Benjamin’s store, it became apparent to Doris that she could be made to feel inferior unless she took matters into her own hands.
‘She would refuse to see herself as a victim - which was, I say, the driving force to all the decisions that she’s made,’ Ms Boone said.
‘The inciting incident was in the store when she realized she was "less than." A lot of people don’t identify with that. But she realized very early on that no one mattered – no one cared unless you care about yourself. Otherwise you were, and are, "less than." That’s the driving force behind everything she does,’ she said.
The first jewel Doris claims to have taken was a $22,000 diamond from a Pittsburgh jewelry store at the age of 23. When her mother left her father, she eventually admitted to her mother how she was procuring the money to support them; her mother was shocked and upset that her daughter was a thief.
'It’s not stealing because I’m only taking what they give me,' Ms Payne allegedly responded.
Success came, she learned, from a few crucial elements. The first was to look the part - salespeople needed to believe that she was capable, and willing, of spending thousands on excessive jewelry. She would decide on her targets by flipping through magazines such as Town & Country – bursting with ads for diamonds and other glamorous jewels.
Doris was known for always looking the part - each time she went on a 'campaign,' her term for a jewel-stealing expedition, she would dress impeccably and carry an expensive handbag
Second was finding the right target. Salespeople at upscale stores, who were used to dealing with high-profile clientele, were more likely to allow her to view as many items of jewelry as she liked.
This was when the element of distraction came in – one she learned many years ago at Mr Benjamin’s store back in Cleveland.
She would slip on a ring, a bracelet, another ring – and take one off, then the other, and put another on. All the while a salesperson would be fetching other items for her – including the object of her attraction.
Additionally, she would work her charm and gain their trust.
‘She’ll say “What happened to that earring?” Everyone is looking around but she’s already taken it,’ Ms Boone said. ‘Then she’ll put it back and say “Oh, there it is!” And when you’re not looking again she takes it again. And you don’t realize until later that it’s gone.’
As time rolled on through the 1950s and 1960s, Doris began to recognize her talent of working jewelry stores, and realized that she would need a partner in crime. Her pursuit eventually led her to meet Harold Brondfield, better known as ‘Babe’.
Babe, who Ms Payne said looked like a young Robert Stack, owned a tavern called Club Caprice in Cleveland at the time. It was a favorite hangout spot among professional football players such as Jim Brown and jazz musicians in the city - a predominantly African-American crowd.
‘He was a big dude in the black community,’ Ms Boone said. ‘He was a hustler.’
Despite the fact that Babe was married and had a daughter, he and Ms Payne struck up an intimate relationship. Babe’s wife Myra was aware of the relationship, according to Ms Boone, but didn’t have a problem as long as Doris ‘knew her place’.
‘She didn’t try to have him. She just used him for what she needed him for basically,’ Ms Boone said. ‘As Doris put it, she [Myra] was his wife during the day, and Doris was his woman at night.’
The tension between their personal and professional relationship, however, proved to be too much. The two were arrested together in Philadelphia – and Babe flipped on her to the authorities. Once, he threw a brick threw her window after becoming jealous of another man in her life.
Scorned by her former lover and on the radar of the police at home, Doris fled to Europe. She traveled across the continent using the funds from her past heists – which she called ‘campaigns’.
Doris has been arrested all across the country, and the world, over the last six decades. Pictured is a map are the numerous locations where she was arrested in the United States
Doris began to recognize her talent of working jewelry stores, and realized that she would need a partner in crime. Her pursuit eventually led her to meet Harold Brondfield, better known as ‘Babe,' pictured left of a 1966 wanted poster describing their collective crimes
After a falling out with Babe, Doris fled to Europe. Her escapades were chronicled in a 2015 documentary titled The Life and Crimes of Doris Payne, which included the recreated scene pictured here
Though she hustled big-ticket items, Doris herself preferred simple hoops and signature rounded shades,such as those worn during this court appearance
In 1974, she landed in Monte Carlo. As was her modus operandi, she looked the part, dressed in sleek designer clothes, donning an expensive handbag and jewelry, hair perfectly coiffed. She glided into a nearby Cartier store, and made off that day with a $500,000 10-carat platinum diamond ring.
When she later entered the airport in Nice, she was stopped by customs agents who suspected her of stealing the precious gem.
In 2005, after being incarcerated in Las Vegas, Doris revealed how she got away with stealing a $500,000 ring from Monte Carlo in 1974
Ms Payne was held for nine months in what she described as a ‘fifth-rate motel’ in the Mediterranean for the duration of the investigation. In 2005, she revealed in an AP interview the inventive way she hid the half-a-million dollar ring from authorities.
One day she asked a woman in charge of the investigation if she could use a pair of nail clippers, and a needle and some thread so she could fix her dress.
With the nail clippers, she claimed to have pulled the diamond from its setting and threw the metal in the sea.
She used the needle and thread to conceal the diamond in her girdle – which she never took off unless to wash it. She was eventually freed and returned to the United States when the ring was never found.
When she came home, her mother had passed away from cancer, her children had been taken from her, and her lover Babe, who was much like a stepfather to her three children, later died of sepsis after an ‘early liposuction procedure’.
‘Doris had a love story with two people. She had one with this man, but more importantly, she had one with herself,’ Ms Boone said.
TV Producer and screenwriter Eunetta Boone, pictured, has spent more than a decade interviewing Doris and sharing her story with the world
'There’s never been a day that I went to steal that I did not get what I went to do,' Doris said in a 2015 documentary about her life.
'I don’t have any regrets about stealing jewelry. I regret getting caught,' she continued.
More often than not, she got away with it. She’d make off with the jewels and sell them before they could be traced back to her. Then she’d be off into the sunset with a pocket full of cash and on her way home to Bedford, Ohio, where she was based.
There were the occasions, however, when she got caught.
Over the years, she’s served jail time in Colorado, California and Nevada. One detective noted that her criminal record is 20 pages long. Once she was even so bold as to list ‘jewel thief’ as her occupation on court documents.
More often than not, Doris got away with her heists. There were the times, however, when she was caught
She was arrested in Atlanta in 2015, left, for stealing a $690 pair of earrings by slipping them in her back pocket. It was then discovered that a warrant was out for her arrest for the theft of a $33,000 ring from a Charlotte, North Carolina jewelry store. Again in 2017, pictured right, she was arrested for shoplifting groceries from an Atlanta Wal-Mart
In the 1980s, she escaped federal custody in Ohio after faking a medical emergency during a hospital visit. She simply walked out – and no one stopped her.
Special Agent Paul Graupmann, who arrested Ms Payne at the time, said: ‘She cannot help herself.’
‘She is a career jewel thief. She thinks she is the best. She’s become notorious ... and that isn’t always good because she gets caught over and over again,’ the now retired agent told the LA Times in 2013.
The longest stint she served in jail was five years of a 12-year sentence in Denver, Colorado in 1999. She was convicted for stealing a $57,000 diamond ring from a Denver Neiman Marcus – which she took aim at after spotting it in Town & Country magazine.
She was eventually banned from entering jewelry stores, an issue caught on tape during the 2015 documentary about her life when she was approached by law enforcement while inside a jewelry store
Hot on the tails of being released, and at the age of 75, Ms Payne was accused of stealing a $30,000 ring from a Neiman Marcus in Palo Alto, California in 2005. She was arrested and jailed a week later after being spotted on security cameras at yet another Neiman Marcus in Las Vegas after pawning the gem.
In addition to those charges, she was accused of stealing yet another ring from a Las Vegas store, skipping bail, and violating her parole from her Denver, Colorado case.
In 2009, she was extradited to Santa Clara County to serve in superior court – where she pleaded no contest to a felony grand theft charge.
Two years later, in 2011, she was arrested yet again for stealing an $8,900 diamond ring from a Macy’s store in Mission Valley, California. At the age of 80, she was sentenced to five years in prison and ordered restitution.
She didn’t serve the entirety of that sentence. By 2013, she was back to her old games.
On October 21, 2013, she stole a $22,000 ring from El Paseo Jewelers in Palm Desert, California, pictured here. Police said she swiped the gem after telling employees she recently had all her own jewelry stolen
On October 21, 2013, she stole a $22,000 ring from El Paseo Jewelers in Palm Desert, California. Police said she swiped the gem after telling employees she recently had all her own jewelry stolen, according to NBC San Diego.
In that case she plead guilty on felony counts of burglary and grand theft. She was sentenced to two years in a county jail and two under mandatory supervision.
Doris stole a $22,000 ring from El Paseo Jewelers in Palm Desert, California that resembled the ring pictured here
By 2015, she had relocated to the Atlanta area. Though her location had changed, her lifestyle hadn’t. She was arrested at an Atlanta mall for stealing a $690 pair of earrings by slipping them in her back pocket. It was then discovered that a warrant was out for her arrest for the theft of a $33,000 ring from a Charlotte, North Carolina jewelry store.
In December 2016 – she was arrested at yet another Atlanta mall for stealing two diamond necklaces, worth nearly $2,000.
Most recently, Ms Payne was arrested for a more shocking crime. It came as a surprise to authorities who she’d become well known to at this point – because it was so mundane.
On July 17, she was arrested at a Walmart in Chamblee, Georgia for attempting to shoplift just $86 of goods: not jewelry – but electrical and pharmaceutical – and groceries. She was still wearing the ankle monitoring bracelet she was required to wear from her December 2016 theft.
In December 2016 – she was arrested at yet another Atlanta mall for stealing two diamond necklaces, worth nearly $2,000
Many theories circulated about what might be the motivation behind Doris’ shift in crime. How did a notorious international jewel thief go from stealing thousands of dollars in diamonds to a medley of items from a local Walmart? Had she lost her touch – or was it for survival?
Ms Boone had a different conclusion: ‘Doris kind of goes to jail on purpose. The reality is, especially now that she’s older, I think when she’s not feeling well when she needs to be cared for she does something stupid like go to Walmart and steal some cigarettes and then she goes so she can get what she needs.
'She’s not in there long and she goes back out. You could say that’s taking advantage – it’s all how you choose to look at it and choose to look at her.’
On July 17, she was arrested at this Walmart in Chamblee, Georgia for attempting to shoplift just $86 of goods. Not jewelry – but electrical and pharmaceutical – and groceries. She was still wearing the ankle monitoring bracelet she was required to wear from her December 2016 theft
Concerns by Ms Payne’s family have been raised about her health in the past. After her 2011 hearing her daughter, who asked to not be named, said that her mother had cardiac pulmonary disease.
Concerns by Ms Payne’s family have been raised about her health in the past. After her 2011 hearing her daughter, who asked to not be named, said that her mother had cardiac pulmonary disease
"If she gets a chill, she will have heart failure," the daughter, who wished to remain unnamed, told NBC San Diego. "It's happened before."
Despite her lifetime of crime, Ms Payne’s daughter said that she ‘is still my mom, and I love her’.
Now 86 years old, Ms Payne finds herself back in jail. Two days after her Walmart arrest, she violated her probation and landed back in the custody of the state. Requests for comment from her lawyer by the DailyMail.com were not returned.
Early on in her life, her youth and beauty was a factor in her success. Now, it seems, the feebleness of her old age and health have struck a chord with judges and courts, who repeatedly avoid harsh punishments for her.
With regard to her 2013 heist, her attorney at the time Gretchen von Helms told the LA Times: “The judge tempered punishment with compassion about her age. He took into account the taxpayers’ pocketbook. And do we really need to incarcerate a nonviolent offender — yes, a repeat offender, that’s true — who’s ill, who has emphysema, who’s elderly?”
Her charm, elegance and swagger has wooed many for decades – and her story is one with layered complexities. Despite her numerous arrests and years spent in prison, it doesn’t seem that Doris has any remorse for the crimes she’s committed
Ms Boone says that she always warns people: ‘Be careful, you’ll fall in love with her.’
Her charm, elegance and swagger has wooed many for decades – and her story is one with layered complexities. Despite her numerous arrests and years spent in prison, it doesn’t seem that Doris has any remorse for the crimes she’s committed. When she appears in court, she promises to the judge that she won’t steal again. In a matter of days, weeks, or months – she always ends up back in the courts again.
‘I don’t understand why the compulsion doesn’t die,’ Ms Boone continued.
‘She was a good girl that became a bad girl. But still thinks she’s a good girl.
‘At the end of the day – she’s gangster.'