Police officer catches woman shoplifting kids’ school clothes — and does the most unexpected thing

A Connecticut police officer did perhaps the exact opposite of what some people might've thought he'd do when he discovered a woman purportedly shoplifting kids' clothes from a local store.

What are the details?

Store workers at a Fairfield, Connecticut, Kohl's called the police on a woman that they suspected was stealing from the store in July. In early August, the officer's story began making its rounds on the internet.

Sgt. Hector Irizarry was the officer who responded to the Kohl's shoplifting call, and once on the scene, arrested a 27-year-old woman who had allegedly been shoplifting at the clothing retailer.

After Irizarry arrested the unnamed 27-year-old woman, he peeked inside her bag to see what could be so important that the woman — who was in the store with two young children — would risk stealing in the presence of minors.

When Irizarry looked into the woman's bag, he discovered that it was a whole lot of kids' clothes — and as a father, immediately understood.

"As I'm going through the bag, I notice that it's a lot of children's clothing," Irizarry said, according to WABC-TV.

Irizarry decided to help out the woman he'd just arrested.

"I took the clothes over to the cash register, I decided to pay for them myself and she didn't know what I was doing," Irizarry said. "Of course, she got emotional, the person with her got emotional and she asked 'What can I do to pay you back?'"

Irizarry's responding request was for the woman to pay it forward, and help out someone in a tough situation when she's able.

Fairfield Police Chief Gary MacNamara told the outlet, "This is just another example of officers doing their job, and at the end of the day, saying, 'I'm a dad, I care about your kids and I'm going to help you put clothes on your daughter.'"

Irizarry said that helping the woman out by purchasing the clothes she was so desperate to have just made sense to him.

"It was just something I felt compelled to do, and it really came from the heart," Irizarry explained. "I just wanted to show law enforcement in a positive light."

According to the Fairfield Citizen, the suspect — whom they later identified as Dannella Scarlett of Bridgeport, Connecticut — was charged with sixth-degree larceny. She was released and promised to appear in court on Aug. 29.