A woman at a mall in Providence, RI was suspected of shoplifting, and she ran away from security guards who were pursuing her. She might have thought she was escaping through the parking garage, jumping over a railing to escape the building. What she didn’t know is that the first level of the parking garage isn’t on the ground.

This happened last night around 7:30 PM, at Providence Place Mall in Rhode Island. Security began following the woman around in Nordstrom, and the department store confirmed that one of their employees was involved.

Police say that she ran after being accused of shoplifting, and attempted to leave the mall through the first floor of the parking garage. Instead, she fell and was seriously injured, and died at a nearby hospital.

A strangely similar case happened just over a year ago in Maryland, where a man accused of shoplifting ran from security staff and tried to escape by running into a pond that he probably didn’t realize was up to 20 feet deep and filled with silt and plants. Emergency personnel, including police, tried to save him but were unable before he drowned.

Police: Suspected shoplifter dies after parking garage jump [AP]

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