A 29-year-old Odenton man called police to report his car stolen. While he was allegedly burglarizing a Verizon store directly across the street. The blood on the store's broken window matched the blood on his hands, shirt, and glasses.
That is not a setup. That is the Howard County Police Department's account of what happened last Thursday morning on Baltimore National Pike.
How police connected it
Officers were already responding to a stolen vehicle report when a burglary was reported at the Verizon store across the street minutes later. They noticed blood on the store's window, then noticed blood on the glasses of the man who'd reported his car stolen. When they asked him to show his hands, there was blood there too, and on his shirt. He was placed in handcuffs. [S0 via primary]
Bodycam footage posted by the department shows the man repeatedly denying he was ever at the Verizon store, while surveillance footage allegedly shows him inside it burglarizing the place. "That's some karma right there dude," one officer says before putting him in the back of the cruiser.
What's confirmed, and what isn't
The core is solid: police identified the suspect as Jalen Godard and charged him with burglary, theft, and destruction of property. The "instant karma" phrase in every headline is not tabloid embellishment, it's a direct quote from an officer at the scene.
Here's the part the viral version glosses over. Whoever drove off with Godard's car is still out there. Police have not released any details about the second thief and have not said the two crimes are connected beyond timing and geography. So the tidy morality tale, one thief robbing another in real time, is unproven. What's documented is that a man reported his own vehicle stolen and blood tied him to the burglary across the street.
The Reddit thread that pushed the story went straight for the absurdity.
“Neighborhood is so tough you can’t even burglarize in peace, like going porch pirate when your car gets stolen”
One tweet rounding up the footage called it "the fastest INSTANT KARMA you'll ever see," which racked up hundreds of likes. [1]
No word yet on whether Godard ever got his car back.
Sources
Primary source: Instant karma: Suspect has vehicle stolen while burglarizing store in Howard County
- Tweet by @KarmaUnl0cked — @KarmaUnl0cked · community
- Reddit comment by TylerFortier_Photo — TylerFortier_Photo · community
- Reddit comment by ctiger12 — ctiger12 · community
- Reddit comment by Johannes_P — Johannes_P · community
- Reddit comment by SoulPixie- — SoulPixie- · community
- Tweet by @ChaosLensX — @ChaosLensX · community
- Tweet by @ThevoiceAlexa — @ThevoiceAlexa · community