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Most mug shots attract attention because of the arrest attached to them. For Cyrena Anne Quast, the opposite happened. After the 35-year-old Minnesota woman was arrested in late August, her booking photo began circulating online, and suddenly people were talking less about what allegedly happened inside a store and more about the famous face they thought they saw staring back at them.
Quast was arrested on Aug. 30 after allegedly stealing two double packs of power tool batteries from a store in Monticello, Minnesota. The batteries were valued at around $580, according to reports citing a criminal complaint. A store employee reportedly recognized Quast as someone suspected of a similar theft days earlier and contacted police.
Quast was subsequently booked into the Wright County jail on a gross misdemeanor theft charge. But once her mug shot started making its way around social media, the alleged shoplifting was quickly competing for attention with something completely unrelated: people thought Quast looked remarkably like Jennifer Lopez.
People Couldn’t Stop Seeing J.Lo
Put Quast’s booking photograph beside a picture of Lopez, and the comparison that captivated social media becomes easier to understand. Both women can be seen with their hair pulled back tightly, while commenters focused on similarities in their facial features and overall appearance. PEOPLE even presented the two photographs side by side as the online comparison gathered momentum.
Some viewers were immediately convinced. “Wow! The resemblance is astounding!” one person commented, according to PEOPLE. Another seemed baffled that anyone could miss it, asking, “How are people not seeing the resemblance.” Elsewhere online, someone admitted, “For a moment I thought it was jlo lmao,” while another blamed the uncanny moment on “a glitch in the matrix.”
Not everybody saw what the internet was seeing. One commenter quoted by PEOPLE dismissed the comparison altogether with a blunt “No resemblance at all.” That disagreement only added another ingredient to the viral moment: Instead of simply looking at a booking photograph, people were studying Quast’s face and deciding for themselves whether the celebrity comparison held up.
Naturally, the ‘Jenny From the Block’ Jokes Arrived
Once Lopez entered the conversation, it didn’t take long for people to reach for one of the singer’s most recognizable songs. Her 2002 hit “Jenny from the Block” became ready-made material for commenters reacting to a mug shot connected to an alleged theft.
One commenter dubbed Quast “the real jenny from the block,” while others got considerably more creative. “In prison she’s known as Jenny from D-Block!” one person joked. Another wrote, “She’s definitely still Jenny from the block.” The comments transformed what began as a local arrest into the kind of odd celebrity-look-alike moment social media tends to seize upon.
Perhaps the most enthusiastic reaction treated the resemblance like a long-lost-family mystery. One commenter called on Lopez to “COME CLAIM YOUR SISTER” and demanded a DNA test. There is, of course, nothing in the supplied reports suggesting any actual connection between Quast and Lopez. The comparison is entirely the work of online observers who believe the two women happen to look alike.
Behind the Viral Photo Is a Real Criminal Case
The jokes can make it easy to forget why the photograph exists in the first place. Quast’s arrest stemmed from allegations that she took roughly $580 worth of power tool batteries. Reports citing the criminal complaint say an employee recognized her in the Monticello store from an alleged theft two days earlier and contacted authorities.
Quast reportedly admitted taking the battery packs and was booked on a gross misdemeanor theft charge. The New York Post reported that she was released the day after her Aug. 30 arrest. The outlet also cited online records indicating that Quast had previous encounters with law enforcement involving offenses including drug possession, DWI, fleeing police, providing false identification and traffic infractions.
None of that stopped one image from taking on a life of its own. What began as a routine booking photograph became a viral celebrity comparison, complete with divided opinions, J.Lo jokes and plenty of double takes. Whether Quast actually resembles Lopez remains firmly in the eye of the beholder, but for the moment, the internet seems far more interested in debating the mug shot than the alleged $580 worth of batteries that led to it.