Re: Shoplifting in Illinois
First of all, relax! You made a dumb mistake but that doesn't make you a bad person.
What will happen is you'll go to court with a criminal defense attoney and hopefully there will be a diversion type program available in your area. Your attorney will know if its an option. What you do is plead guilty, complete the sentence (could be probation, community service, shoplifting class) and then afterwards, your records goes away, so there is no need to get it expunged. I highly doubt you'll get any jail time.
Your arrest record however is a different matter and most likely will not go away. Be sure to ask your attorney about this. Once you complete the criminal proceedings (most likely after but can come before) then you will have a letter in the mail asking to pay restitiution. This is a CIVIL demand in which you will have to pay a bill to the store. If you don't pay it, the bill or fine will go up and up until the store takes you to civil court and gets a judgement againt you. Pay it the minute you get the letter if you can, if not be sure you don't miss a payment or make one late.
I don't know if your employer will find out about this or not, but most likely not. I would suggest that you save your money, between the court costs, civil demand, attorney fees, probation costs (if you get this) you'll be lucky to get out of this with it costing you $1000.00. THINK next time!