Rochester Meat Heist: Thief Ordered to Pay $4000 in Restitution

Rochester, MN (KROC-AM News) - A man convicted of stealing thousands of dollars worth of meat from a Rochester business was sentenced this morning.

According to court records, Rochester police were called to the Ye Olde Butcher Shoppe in late November 2023 after the business discovered the theft. Court documents say the officers viewed surveillance camera videos from the night of November 25 that showed two men loading a trailer with what appeared to be dozens of boxes of meat with an estimated value of more than $5000.

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The criminal complaint filed in the case indicate Albert Lea police identified one of the men in the videos as 46-year-old Dustin Dean Zamora, who was arrested a couple of days later by Albert Lea police in connection with the meat theft and the theft of an auto part reported in Albert Lea. The court document says the arresting officer found a piece of a box from the Rochester business in the vehicle Zamora was driving at the time of his arrest.

He was charged in Olmsted County Court with aiding and abetting theft and later entered a guilty plea to the charge in exchange for a downward departure from state sentencing guidelines. Under the terms of the plea agreement, prosecutors also agreed to drop the charges stemming from a separate felony theft case from September 2023.

Today, he was given a stayed to year prison sentence and was placed on supervised probation for five years. Zamora has also been ordered to pay nearly $4000 in restitution.

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