A man posing as cleared to buy a rifle allegedly walked out of a Bensalem Walmart Friday afternoon with a Winchester .308 tucked inside a bag he grabbed off the shelf, then disappeared toward a SEPTA bus stop near Neshaminy Mall. Bensalem Police are now asking the public for help identifying him.
According to crimewatch.net, officers responded to the Walmart at 3461 Horizon Boulevard at approximately 2:31 p.m. on Friday for a report of a retail theft. The report traces the incident back roughly an hour earlier, when a Black male wearing a black jacket and dark blue jeans entered the store at around 1:40 p.m. carrying a collapsible scooter.
Fake Paperwork and a Restricted Area
Once inside, the man put on a yellow vest and selected a rifle bag offered for sale, according to the same report. He then allegedly presented fraudulent paperwork claiming “clearance” for a Winchester .308 rifle to an employee in the sporting-goods department, the account states.
Surveillance footage reviewed by investigators showed the man entering a restricted, employee-only area, where he placed the rifle inside the rifle bag, per the crimewatch.net report. He then exited the store through the garden area and left the scene, the report notes.
Trail Leads Toward a SEPTA Stop
At approximately 1:50 p.m., surveillance footage captured the man traveling through the Neshaminy Mall parking lot toward a SEPTA bus stop, the report states. Bensalem Police are asking anyone with information about the incident, or who can help identify the man in the surveillance images, to contact Detective Tom Jackson at (215) 633-3667.
Part of a Broader Pattern at the Same Store
This is not the first theft case tied to the Horizon Boulevard Walmart. In April 2024, Bensalem Police investigated a separate theft at the store, reported at approximately 10:10 p.m., in which an unknown white male stole roughly $100 worth of merchandise and fled in an older-model green pickup truck with New Jersey registration, according to bucks.crimewatchpa.com.
Weeks later, in May 2024, officers were dispatched to the same Walmart for a theft in progress involving a male and female, reports lowerbuckssource.net. That case ended with the arrest of 41-year-old Beau Booth after he resisted officers; police said they found a fully loaded Walther .22-caliber semiautomatic handgun with its safety off in his shoulder bag.
Retail theft has also cropped up at nearby Neshaminy Mall stores. As delawarevalleynews.com reported, police sought two apparently unrelated shoplifters in late 2025, including a man accused of concealing $212 worth of DVDs and walking out on foot, and a blonde woman accused of leaving Boscov’s with roughly $600 in merchandise before fleeing in a dark-colored Dodge Ram pickup.
A Task Force Points to Falling Numbers
The new case lands against a backdrop of declining retail theft reports townshipwide. Bensalem’s Secure Theft Reduction Task Force, a partnership formed in early 2024 among the Bensalem Economic Development Corporation, the mayor’s office, the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office and the Bensalem Police Department, combines education, technology, reporting resources, intelligence sharing and enforcement to combat shoplifting and internal business theft, according to the Lower Bucks Times.
Reported retail theft incidents in the township fell 29 percent in 2025 after an earlier spike, the outlet reported, and dropped another 16 percent from January through May 2026 compared with the same stretch the year before. Police say they are clearing retail theft cases at a 78 percent rate, per the same reporting.
No suspect has been identified in Friday’s case, and Bensalem Police continue to rely on tips from the public as they work to track the man down.
