Fired Employee Returns to Chick-fil-A for Elaborate $80,000 Mac and Cheese Heist

The Scheme Unfolds

A month after being fired from his job at a Grapevine, Texas Chick-fil-A, Keyshun Jones was recorded on surveillance video standing behind the counter at the restaurant from where he'd been terminated a month earlier . What happened next defied belief: Jones allegedly used the restaurant's register to ring up roughly 800 orders of macaroni and cheese trays and then issue refunds to his personal credit cards .

The audacious scheme wasn't a one-time occurrence. Jones allegedly returned to the restaurant multiple times and entered fake food orders into the cash register before issuing refunds to his personal credit card . The refund totaled just over $80,000 , making this one of the most expensive mac and cheese capers in recent memory.

Detectives were alerted about the alleged theft on Nov. 29 by the owner of the franchise, who directed them to CCTV video that showed a man using a cash register to order $80,105 of the comfort food . The investigation revealed that Jones's direct deposit had been set up through the Navy Federal Credit Union before he'd been fired in October .

A Simple Exploit with Massive Consequences

The beauty of Jones's scheme lay in its simplicity. Schemes involving fake orders and fraudulent refunds are a common form of employee theft in the restaurant industry, where workers with register access can manipulate point-of-sale systems to issue unauthorized refunds . No sophisticated hacking was required—just knowledge of the system and access to the restaurant.

The price of Chick-fil-A's mac-and-cheese varies by location, typically costing about $5 for a small serving and $10 for a large serving, so doing that 800 times racked up quite the bill . The choice of mac and cheese wasn't random either— Chick-fil-A's Mac & Cheese has become one of the chain's most popular side items since its nationwide rollout in 2019, making it a high-volume product that wouldn't immediately raise suspicions.

The Hunt and Capture

Jones evaded arrest after multiple attempts to locate him , turning what started as a theft investigation into a manhunt. The Texas Attorney General's Fugitive Task Force and the Fort Worth Police Department assisted with the arrest when Jones was finally captured on April 17, 2026.

The charges against Jones are serious. Online jail records from Tarrant County show Keyshun Jones is charged with property theft, money laundering, evading arrest, unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon and fraudulent use of identification . Jones is being held on a $117,500 bond , and if convicted, he could face up to 10 years in state prison under Texas law .

Wake-Up Call for Restaurant Security

This incident exposes vulnerabilities that extend far beyond one Grapevine location. For Chick-fil-A, a brand known for tight operations and customer service, this situation raises questions about internal controls and how something like this could go unnoticed for so long . The fact that a terminated employee could repeatedly access the restaurant and operate the register system suggests gaps in security protocols.

For restaurant owners nationwide, Jones's scheme serves as a costly reminder that employee theft often comes from those with intimate knowledge of operations. For businesses across DFW, it's a wake-up call: tighten up, audit often, and don't assume the system can't be played . Simple measures like immediately revoking system access for terminated employees and implementing better transaction monitoring could prevent similar schemes from reaching such staggering amounts.