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  "path": "/2026/06/10/mum-wrongly-accused-stealing-sports-direct-facial-recognition-cameras-28707740/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-06-10T06:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "https://metro.co.uk",
  "tags": [
    "News",
    "UK",
    "Crime News",
    "London",
    "Sainsbury’s shopper Warren Rajah",
    "London Tube strikes – full list of affected lines and exact time they will start",
    "Cenk Uygur and Hasan Piker banned from visiting UK for SXSW hours before festival kick-off",
    "London’s ‘most luxurious’ secret garden is reopening — with strict rule for visitors",
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  "textContent": "Anamaria Mihai had taken her daughter shopping in Sports Direct in Woolwich when she was accused of being a thief (Picture: w8media)\n\nFacial recognition cameras are following shoppers around in London, and innocent people are being publicly humiliated as they shop for their children.\n\nAnamaria Mihai had taken her daughter shopping in Sports Direct, Woolwich, in April, when she noticed staff members begin following her around.\n\nThe 48-year-old and her daughter had popped into the store to buy a new pair of shorts, but down every aisle and around every corner the manager stayed just metres away from them.\n\nAs Anamaria jokingly said, ‘You are following me’, the store manager shouted: ‘Yes, because you are a thief.’\n\nShe**told Metro** : ‘I wanted to die on the spot, he said I was trying to steal from them in front of everyone.\n\n‘He was loud and aggressive, and acted like I was the biggest criminal. I just broke down in tears. I quickly paid for my stuff and then left.’\n\nThe mum said she felt humiliated after being wrongly labelled a thief (Picture: w8media)\n\nHis ‘evidence’ was the Facewatch recognition system, which flagged the mum’s face as having stolen a pair of shoes almost a year ago – something which Ana-Maria said categorically did not happen.\n\nAnd it is not just in that one Sport Direct which uses the cameras. Sainsbury’s, River Island and Home Bargains are just some of the brands using Facewatch’s system, which according to their website, has a 99.98% accuracy of recognising offenders.\n\nYet this is not the first time shoppers have been ‘publicly humiliated’ by the cameras. In February, Metro revealed Sainsbury’s shopper Warren Rajah was escorted out of the store after shop staff mistakenly believed he was flagged by their Facewatch cameras.\n\nBut Anamaria’s case is the first reported case of someone being placed on the system in error, and the mum says it was still up to her to prove she was innocent rather than Facewatch proving she was guilty.\n\nWarren Rajah was also thrown out of Sainsbury’s after being wrongly accused of stealing(Picture: Justin Griffiths-Williams)\n\nShe was instructed by the company to send over her passport and after submitting a subject access request to see what photo evidence they had, they sent her back a close-up picture of her face, leaving the same Sports Direct store in August.\n\n##  Latest London news\n\n  * London Tube strikes – full list of affected lines and exact time they will start\n  * Cenk Uygur and Hasan Piker banned from visiting UK for SXSW hours before festival kick-off\n  * London’s ‘most luxurious’ secret garden is reopening — with strict rule for visitors\n\n\n\n_**To get the latest news from the capital, visit Metro's** London news hub._\n\nThe mum had once again been shopping with her daughter and bought more than £80 worth of goods in cash.\n\nAnamaria said: ‘I remember exactly what happened. I bought my daughter a new pair of Converse she desperately wanted, but they were a lot of money. So I had sent my husband all of these texts saying whether we thought we should buy them.’\n\nDeciding yes, Ana-Maria bought the pair of shoes with her daughter wearing them out of the store. As they left, the mum carried the old pair of Pumas before putting them in the bin outside.\n\n‘A staff member saw this, and thought I had stolen the Pumas,’ Ana-Maria said. ‘So they put me on the system, and that was that, there were no checks or anything. I was guilty until proven innocent.’\n\nAfter showing them the texts and the items she purchased, she has since been taken off the system, and as an apology Sports Direct sent her a £30 voucher to use in store despite her ‘never wanting to go back there’.\n\nSports Direct declined to comment.\n\nJasleen Chaggar, Senior Legal and Policy Officer at Big Brother Watch, said: ‘It’s the stuff of Kafkaesque nightmares to be trapped in a maze of bureaucracy and forced to hand over even more personal data just to be told the accusation.\n\n‘The idea that we are all one facial recognition mistake away from being falsely accused of a crime, thrown out of a store and blacklisted without explanation should send a shiver down the spine.’\n\nFacewatch spokesperson Eric Woollard-White said: ‘We understand how upsetting a misunderstanding of this nature can be, particularly when it happens in a public setting. As soon as Facewatch was made aware, the matter was reviewed, and the relevant data was removed. We can confirm the customer is no longer on the Facewatch system.\n\n‘When an individual contacts us to ask whether Facewatch holds their personal data, we are legally required under UK data protection law to verify their identity before disclosing any information.\n\n‘We continually work with our retail partners to support responsible and proportionate use of the system and respond promptly whenever any individual raises a concern.’\n\n******Get in touch with our news team by emailing us atwebnews@metro.co.uk.******\n\n**For more stories like this,** check our news page.\n\nComment now Comments \nAdd Metro as a Preferred Source on Google\nAdd as preferred source\n",
  "title": "Mum wrongly accused of being a thief in Sports Direct by facial recognition cameras"
}