An autistic woman has turned herself in to the authorities after years on the run following a shoplifting incident in the late 1990s, police have confirmed. 

Kelsey Dacey, 37, told reporters that she has spent the better part of three decades “looking over her shoulder” after taking the Barry M shade from Superdrug without paying for it when she was 10 years old. 

Dacey confessed: “I didn’t even mean to steal it. I dropped it and couldn’t find it on the floor. When I got home, I realised it was in the bag I’d been holding – but the Supreme Court are hardly going to believe that.”

“I spent weeks waiting for the SWAT team to arrive,” she continued. “When a year passed and nobody arrested me, I realised I was legally in the clear – but what about my conscience?”

“I did everything I could to absolve myself,” Dacey explained. “I donated the exact cost of the nail polish to charity. I never wore nail polish again. I even confessed to a priest, despite the fact that I’m Jewish.”

Dacey hopes that by paying her debt to society, she can finally find inner peace, adding: “Whatever punishment they give me, it can’t be worse than the punishment I’ve given myself.”

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