Thieves Should First Become Good Liars.

We have, in one of the classes I work with, a female student who is known to steal little (and, sometimes, not so little) things from teachers and other students around school.  While lots of people know she does this, it's hard to catch her with the stolen items in her possession.

For the purposes of this blog, I will call this girl "Jane," although Jane is obviously not her real name.  In fact, her name sounds nothing like "Jane" at all.

Today, during one of the afternoon classes, I was using a blue mechanical pencil to jot down some notes at my desk near the back of the classroom.  I was also watching the students to make sure they were paying attention to the lesson.  When I noticed some students on the other side of the room daydreaming, I set down my pencil and walked over to get them back on task.  I was still up and away from my desk a few minutes later when the class-change bell rang.

As the students were leaving the room, I walked back to my desk to finish making my notes, so that I wouldn't forget what I was supposed to be making notes about in the first place.  I sat down at the desk, but my pencil had disappeared.

Then I remembered, Jane sits right beside my desk.



Now, please understand that the pencil was nothing special...just a Bic click-top mechanical pencil with .9mm #2 lead.  I have a dozen more just like it, locked safely in my desk drawer.  But, students must not be allowed to think they can take things off my desk unnoticed.

I knew what class Jane had gone to after ours, and so I excused myself to go find her.  I asked the teacher in that classroom if I could speak to Jane in the hallway for a minute.  Jane came into the hallway looking quite angelic.  Our conversation went as follows....

Me: Jane, there is something missing from my desk.

Jane: I didn't take nothin from your desk, but do you want my green pencil instead?

Me: I didn't say I was missing a pencil.

Jane: (after a long "oh crap"-style pause) Oh.....well, I guessed.

Me: Jane, either you return my pencil now, or I'll have the deans search your bags.  It's your choice.

Jane: I didn't take nothin, but you can have my green pencil if you want it instead!

At this point, I walked Jane back to her desk in this classroom and had her gather all her things.  I escorted her to the dean's office, and lucked out and discovered the dean and the SRO (school resource officer, a Sheriff's Deputy assigned to our school) sitting in the dean's office chatting.  I marched Jane into the office, sat her down in the empty chair, and told them what had happened, repeating for them the conversation I had already had with Jane.

She denied, again, having taken the pencil.

The dean and SRO searched her purse and bookbag, and produced my pencil in only a few minutes.  Jane, upon seeing that they had found the pencil, says "Oh!  THAT pencil?!  I didn't know that was YOUR pencil, Ms. Getz!"

Idiot.

If you're going to steal things, you must first learn to be a better liar.  And, it wouldn't hurt to learn to ditch the evidence, either!