FARMINGTON — Two men from Portland and one from Massachusetts are charged with stealing $5,000 worth of electronics and computer equipment from Walmart by using a garbage can Saturday night.

Jacob Landry, 37, and Brian Elliott, 35, both of Portland, and Michael Lovejoy, 31, from Leominster, Mass., were stopped on the Red Schoolhouse Road about 8 p.m. Saturday and charged with felony theft, police said. A store employee spotted them and called police.

Police Officer Darin Gilbert said the men left through a door in the lawn and garden center with a garbage can full of video games, DVDs, computer software programs and electronics.

Police describe such incidents as “push-out thefts” in which an item or items are concealed inside a container, which is then pushed through security.

Police Sgt. Michael Adcock, with help from University of Maine at Farmington police officer Adam Welch, stopped a blue Honda Civic shortly after it left the store on Routes 2 and 4. Inside were the three men and the merchandise, Gilbert said.

Besides the merchandise, there was also a list of several Walmart stores in Maine and some were checked off, Farmington Police Department secretary Rachel Haseltin said.

She said there have been several similar thefts involving thousands of dollars of merchandise at Wal-Marts throughout the state, she said.

Landry posted $5,000 cash bail and was released from the Franklin County Detention Center on Sunday. He has a court date of June 24. Elliott and Lovejoy remained at the detention center as of Monday afternoon.

abryant@sunjournal.com