# Dangerous cheese thieves must be stopped! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 25, 2003, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548 "2003-10-25T20:15:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![elfbabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b782af/32.png) [@elfbabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfbabe)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/1 "2003-10-25T20:15:41Z")
[Our Story:](http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/news/102403_local_cheese.html) 15-year-old wants melted cheese to go with his unhealthy lunch items. 15-year-old picks up a container of melted cheese and attempts to leave with it. Cafeteria employee stops him and informs him that said cheese costs 25 cents. 15-year-old attempts to pay for the cheese. Payment is refused. Police are callled. 15-year-old is issued a $150 ticket for theft of cheese. … What the hell is WRONG with people?! It’s a 25 cent container of cheese! Even if the kid’s lying and he did intend to steal the cheese, isn’t this something that could be handled with oh, say, detention? > [@](#): > > Deer Park officials tell Eyewitness News the school has one to five cheese thefts per week and this is how they will continue to handle the suspected thefts. Hmm, one to five cheese thefts per week, let’s calculate how much that’s costing them. There are 180 school days in a year, or 36 weeks of five days each. Let’s assume they are robbed of five cheese containers per week, as I’m sure some dangerous, incorrigible criminals take more than one cheese cup per theft. That’s 5 cups per week x .25 per cup x 36 weeks = $45 total cost to taxpayers for the school system’s lost cheese. Terrible, truly terrible. Total cost to taxpayers for the prosecution of this case, as estimated by the tv station that reported this? $396. Aaaaargh. Stupid humans. Elfbabe SMASH! ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/2 "2003-10-25T20:48:24Z")
A 15 year old stealing cheese today is tomorrow’s terrorist welfare mother illegal alien non-english speaking crack-smoking carjacker. Sounds to me like disaster was narrowly averted! ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/3 "2003-10-25T20:50:56Z")
> [@](#): > > “There is a problem here, and this is how we have chosen to deal with that problem,” said Matt Lucas with Deer Park ISD. I got the idea that the kid didn’t know that there was a $.25 cost on the cheese. For the school to refuse payment and then call the police…mindboggling. The people who are supposed to be educating our kids are setting some really piss poor examples. I really hope that the judge laughs this out of court and puts the school in their place. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/4 "2003-10-25T21:03:18Z")
I was in a pub in Scotland a few years ago and a lad who looked barely old enough to be allowed entry walked through selling packets of sliced cheese for a pound. My friend bought one from him. I thought to myself that seemed a very strange thing to do, but I reckoned maybe it was just a Glasgow thing. An hour later my friend suddenly said “I can’t believe I bought a packet of sliced cheese in a pub!” We had a good laugh afterwards imagining this young fella going into a shop, desperately trying to think of something he can steal to re-sell in the pubs, and settling on packets of sliced cheese… ---
**Author:** ![TeaElle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8491ac/32.png) [@TeaElle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TeaElle)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/5 "2003-10-25T21:19:53Z")
If I were given this ticket, I would mount the biggest, baddest defense ever known to man, including photos of the cheese sauce sitting there without any signage indicating price and character witnesses out the wazoo. I’d make the school district suffer for their shortsightedness. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/6 "2003-10-25T21:39:19Z")
"No PRICE on the cheese. And… There was _ **SLIME** _ in the ice machine! _MAR_vin Zindler - _EYE_witness News!" ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/7 "2003-10-25T21:47:00Z")
I’m thinking there is one piece to this story we’re not getting. The reason I feel that way is this: I’ve been in and out of law enforcement for the past 20+ years. I still work part-time as a patrolman. Why, when the police showed up, couldn’t this kid communicate to them that he thought the cheese was free and mistakenly took it? Has this boy been in trouble before and they didn’t believe him? I’ve been to stupid calls like this, where I told the complainant “this was all a mistake. Case closed”. No arrests, no tickets. It just seems to me something here is missing. Was there a sign by the cheese that stated it’s price? Is it common knowledge that it costs a quarter and this kid should know better? Theft is theft regardless of amount, but the story makes it seem like it was an honest mistake. Something seems like it’s missing here. If he truely thought it was free and mistakenly took it, thinking it was free, why was a still ticket issued? Why wasn’t he believed? What isn’t this story telling us? Or are these the kind of cops who can’t/aren’t allowed to make decisions and write on everything and let the DA/judge figure it out? That happens in some places. It’s bullshit, but it happens. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/8 "2003-10-25T22:19:41Z")
Though it’s in the Greater Houston area, Deer Park is/was a relatively small town. Maybe the police DO know the kid as a trouble maker. Or maybe the dept requires them them to cite people regardless, instead of making judgement calls. (all fairly good insights to how I remember the place, **pk**.) [shrug] Still, beats me. Deer Park still counts as a small town, doesn’t it? I haven’t been there in about 15 years. ---
**Author:** ![elfbabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b782af/32.png) [@elfbabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfbabe)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/9 "2003-10-25T22:29:56Z")
I thought about the fact that the kid might be lying. But even if things are entirely opposite from what he said and he knew he was stealing the cheese and refused outright to pay for it when confronted, I still can’t imagine why the police would have been called in. I do feel kind of bad for the guy who had to write the ticket, though. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/10 "2003-10-25T22:33:38Z")
Maybe the principal’s name is Bligh or Queeg? Both the mutiny of the Bounty and the mutiny of the Caine started out with some stolen cheese. Better teach those rascals a lesson! I say flogg him with the cat 'o nine tails. That’ll teach him and the rest of the crew a lesson. ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2003, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/11 "2003-10-25T22:55:52Z")
[QUOTE] \*Originally posted by NoClueBoy \* **Or maybe the dept requires them them to cite people regardless, instead of making judgement calls.** [QUOTE] One of the qualities that’s looked for in a person who’s applying for a police position is if they can make decisions on their own. I’m just wondering why a ticket was issued when it sounds like an honest mistake was made…a mistake the kid was willing to correct. What did that cop find out that the story isn’t telling us? **Both the mutiny of the Bounty and the mutiny of the Caine started out with some stolen cheese.** Didn’t the Caine Mutiny involve stolen strawberries? ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2003, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/12 "2003-10-26T00:15:41Z")
By golly, it _was_ strawberries. . . and cheese. . . sort of > [@](#): > > [http://www.law.utexas.edu/lpop/etext/jmlc/rosenberg31.htm](http://www.law.utexas.edu/lpop/etext/jmlc/rosenberg31.htm) > > the case of a missing quart of frozen strawberries. Insisting that the remaining portion of a gallon of strawberries, earmarked for the Caine’s officers, has been stolen, Queeg appoints Maryk, who is simultaneously running his secret investigation of his captain’s mental state, as the head of a “Board of Investigation” and charges him with finding the thief. Maryk’s official inquiry turns up nothing. Queeg, however, overrules this judgment and issues his own, based on a precedent from his own legal experience in the Navy. While a young ensign, Queeg claims, he solved a similar case, involving pilfered cheese, by proving that someone had made a duplicate key to the ship’s icebox. He insists that the Caine’s strawberries disappeared in the same way. Thus, he charges his officers with conducting a shipboard dragnet in which every crewman will be strip-searched and in which every key will be confiscated, tagged, and tested against the lock on the ship’s icebox. You know how these kids are. They start stealing cheese and end up stealing strawberries. ---
**Author:** ![Capt\_B.Phart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc29f/32.png) [@Capt\_B.Phart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt_B.Phart)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2003, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dangerous-cheese-thieves-must-be-stopped/209548/13 "2003-10-26T15:57:13Z")
Mmmmm… Forbidden Cheese… ok… I’m not proud.