Woman, Just Out Of Prison, Arrested For 397th Time

Dec. 22, 2013

Shermaine Miles (Cook County Sheriff)

(STMW) – Last month on the train ride home from prison, Shermaine Miles said she was done with booze — done with the old life of petty crime, the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting.

Old habits apparently die hard.

The woman who has racked up a near-record 396 arrests picked up one more this week when she was hauled off an Edgewater street for a host of alleged offenses, including misdemeanor battery, theft, reckless conduct and drinking in public.

Miles, 52, was due to appear at the George Leighton courthouse at 26th and California Friday, police said.

“It’s sad,” remarked Ald. James Cappleman (46th), a Miles victim in August 2012.

After her release from Logan Correctional Center in Downstate Lincoln Nov. 18, Miles headed to Humboldt Park to a second-chance residential home for ex-inmates. At the time, Miles — whose arrests have mostly occurred on the North Side — said she planned to quit drinking for good and stay away from her drinking buddies on the North Side.

But the Edgewater business community — which dreaded Miles’ return — began seeing her in her old haunts earlier this month.

Miles was arrested Wednesday after allegedly being identified as the woman who approached a 63-year-old man in the 5600 block of North Winthrop and stole a set of keys from him, police said. Miles was found nearby, drinking and “engaging in a physical altercation with a male companion,” police said.

(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2013. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)