As recently as yesterday, investigators with the Los Angeles County sheriff’s department were wondering if anyone would be dumb enough to take “selfie” photos on a stolen phone and upload them to the original owner’s online photo stream.

The story in question, dubbed the “pillow selfie,” involved a July 30 break-in and burglary in Santa Clara. A woman was robbed, with the thieves taking jewelry, electronics, and more. Among the stolen items were several iPhones, one of which ended up in the hands of an attractive couple whose selfie, taken posed against a pillow, has gone viral. The story even made its way into PennLive’s “Daily Buzz” report, far from where the burglary initially took place.

Now, however, it seems that the mystery has been solved. After police announced the selfie couple as “persons of interest” in their investigation of the July 30 burglary, the young man from the photograph, Larry Beltran Jr., came forward to try to clear his name. The way Beltran tells it, he got the stolen iPhone as a gift from his aunt, who herself bought two phones at a swap meet for $80. Not knowing his photos would end up going viral, Beltran took an innocent selfie with his girlfriend.

“It’s embarrassing,” Beltran said to NBC Los Angeles. “I had no idea it would be all over the news or anything. That was just between me and my girlfriend.”

After the photo showed up on the burglarized woman’s cloud account, she turned it over to the police, believing Beltran and his unidentified girlfriend to be the culprits. Police subsequently posted the photos online, looking for any information that might lead to an arrest. In other words, Beltran’s photos were very quickly between himself, his girlfriend, and everybody else.

However, it now looks as if this story has a happy ending, at least for the so-called selfie couple. Los Angeles police have removed the photo from their website – though copies of it have since popped up in newspapers all over the country – and Beltran and his girlfriend seem to be off the suspects list.