# So what have you stolen? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 25, 2002, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939 "2002-06-25T20:29:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![elf6c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c57346/32.png) [@elf6c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elf6c)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/21 "2002-06-26T16:59:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by belladonna \* > \*\*My one year old stole candy last night! We were at the grocers and I had him in the buggy while I picked up a few things. I browse for a while and then get what I need, chat with the cashier, pay for my purchases and push lil’guy out the door and all the way across the lot to my car. I’m pulling him out of the buggy and realize he’s holding a HUGE tootsie roll, this thing was at least a foot long! I don’t know how I managed to not see it, or how he got it past a cashier, a bagger, and a guard at the door, but _my god_ was that funny. I kind of just went “Eh?” and he held it up in the air and started waving it around, grinning like a fool and shouting “dZat, dZat”. > “Yes, Phil, I see that.” 😃 > > bella \*\* Don’t worry **Bella** I think he lacked the _Mens Rea_ required for a conviction. As they say on the Simpsons- no state would convict a baby, well maybe Texas. . . I did steal candy as a kid, and do still feel a bit guilty. The was the typical teen age boy hijinks as well :rolleyes: . ---
**Author:** ![Kaspar\_Hauser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b3f665/32.png) [@Kaspar\_Hauser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaspar_Hauser)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/22 "2002-06-26T17:31:09Z")
I only used to steal books and magazines in high school, but one time I stole some of that green slime stuff that was big in the 80’s from Kay-Bee. It had a glow-in-the-dark turtle in it. I think that was the last thing I ever stole. ---
**Author:** ![ElwoodCuse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/edb3f5/32.png) [@ElwoodCuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElwoodCuse)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/23 "2002-06-26T18:53:44Z")
Pretty banal stuff–office supplies, restuarant coasters (the cardboard ones that are probably for you to take anyway), and of course, several gigs worth of mp3s (but let’s not open this can of worms). I used to know someone who estimates that he stole about $15,000 worth of clothes from the dept. store he works at. He had so much stuff that he donated four garbage bags full of clothes to the Salvation Army. ---
**Author:** ![Eats\_Crayons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/278dde/32.png) [@Eats\_Crayons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eats_Crayons)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/24 "2002-06-26T21:34:50Z")
When I was four, I attended a kindergarten class that had pink blocks. The largest was about the size of a grapefruit, the smallest was just a little smaller than an ice cube. We were always encouraged to build our block towers like a pyramid with the big block on the bottom. One day, I stole the smallest block. By the time I got home, I was wracked with guilt! I tried to hide it in my dresser, but was still terrified of discovery. It was so wrong! I couldn’t deal with the guilt anymore, but was afraid to take it back to school, so I buried it in a playground sandbox down the street. ---
**Author:** ![Kal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9de053/32.png) [@Kal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kal)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/25 "2002-06-26T21:34:50Z")
When I was about 3, I went to a local newspaper shop with my mum. On a shelf behind the counter was a Matchbox car that I wanted but my mum wouldn’t buy it for me - even after a lengthy pleading session. We finished our shopping and she took me home. Back home, unable to watch [Mary, Mungo and Midge](http://www.fortunecity.com/lavender/tombstone/890/mary.htm) because I wanted this car so much but didn’t have a _nice_ mum who would get it for me, I came up with a criminal masterplan - I’d go and get it myself. I went and got the Kalmobile (aka: My purple tricycle) and pedaled off in the direction of the shops. When I get there my heart sank, the shop was closed for lunch. Not to be put off too much, I tried the door anyway. It opened! The fools had forgotten to lock the shop! Barely containing my evil glee, I ran around the back of the counter, grabbed the car off the shelf and made my way back outside. Then I jumped onto the Kalmobile and rode home as fast as my little legs would go - all the while checking behind me to see if I was being chased. I was happily playing with my new car when my criminal act was discovered: My mum caught me. She knew I didn’t own a car like that. She knew that I had been, as she called it, “Pestering” her for an identical car at the shop that morning. I was busted. There followed an interrogation, shouting, the screams of an innocent young child having his backside spanked, tears and a march back to the shop to return the stolen goods. I miss that car. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![UWmite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/d26b3c/32.png) [@UWmite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UWmite)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/26 "2002-06-26T22:09:38Z")
I accidentally waltzed out of a convenience store with some scotch tape once. I felt sort of bad, but not bad enough to return it. In high school when I worked in a toy store I pocketed a few small items. Mostly just little Hello Kitty erasers and things. Sometimes that crap is just too cute for its own good. [rationalize]Besides, they owed me anyway, right? Right?!?[/rationalize] ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/27 "2002-06-26T22:29:20Z")
I’ve never taken anything from a store or public place, but have indeed swiped office supplies. Also, when a friend and I were working at our high school over a summer, we photocopied a bunch of pictures from magazines for ourselves; I guess that counts as stealing because it wasn’t our copier and it certainly wasn’t work-related. ---
**Author:** ![jools](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b3f665/32.png) [@jools](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jools)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/28 "2002-06-26T23:56:51Z")
I’ve stolen a Mr. Freeze when I was 8 and I stole my first bra. Oh and i’ve filled up on office supplies from work!!! ---
**Author:** ![Flamsterette\_X](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/41988e/32.png) [@Flamsterette\_X](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flamsterette_X)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/29 "2002-06-27T01:08:35Z")
I used to shoplift all the time, back when I thought the concept of a “five-finger discount” was cool. I’m not proud of it, _per se_, but that’s part of my past. Yes, I knew it was wrong (who doesn’t?), but I did it anyways. :shrug: :smack: However, I don’t do that anymore, as I’ve learned my lesson. Getting caught while trying to steal a CD from the CD shop (:smack: because even I should have known that they protect those items against shoplifters), and getting caught while stealing stuff from one of the local malls (and getting banned from the mall for life because of it) will do it, if nothing else. Of course, I’ve since been back to the mall I was banned from many times since that incident, but only after a couple of years, at least. (and haven’t stolen anything from that mall) [ul] [li]numerous bottles of whiteout from office supply stores (I remember that once this lady looked at me strangely as I was contemplating three whiteout bottles, and told me that she hoped I wasn’t going to steal them; I did, but only after she’d left the store)[/li][li]numerous boxes of Christmas cards from the card shops (I used to do this for a few years every November/December)[/li][li]planners, diaries, etc. to give away as Christmas gifts (hey, it saved me money… and I don’t know how I got away with it)[/li][li]about 15 Whistler souvenir pens from a shop there (for some of my school friends as presents)[/li][li]a bath sachet from an outlet store in Seattle (I was relieved when my family crossed the border without incident)[/li][li]binders (and paper from those binders) in the lost-and-found box at my junior high school[/li][li]someone’s lock from their locker (we didn’t get on too well anyways… of course, I gave it back)[/li][li]paper, binders, stickers, pens, and pencils from my mom’s boxes of school supplies (sometimes her pens didn’t work… why keep pens that don’t work?)[/li][li]money from my dad’s desk, and my grandma’s wallet (never from my mom, despite what she thought)[/li][li]a paperback book (_The Last Plantegenets_) from a table at the college I was going to at the time (I think you were supposed to pay for it, at any rate)[/li][li]along the lines of inadvertently stealing something from a store (as opposed to deliberately stealing it), I recently stole a 12L box of laundry from the local Save-On-Foods by placing it in the bottom section of the shopping cart, and it somehow went by the cashier (it wasn’t on my receipt, but it only cost $4.99 with tax… and I figure the same as **TroubleAgain** , heh heh)[/li][li]stolen my share of candy and such, too (definitely sure about that)[/li][li]probably other items which I’ve mercifully forgotten[/li][/ul] Damn… I’m going to hell now, aren’t I? Just LOOK at that extensive list! :eek: F\_X ---
**Author:** ![WSLer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a6a055/32.png) [@WSLer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WSLer)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/30 "2002-06-27T01:10:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by belladonna \* > \*\*My one year old stole candy last night! I don’t know how I managed to not see it, or how he got it past a cashier, a bagger, and a guard at the door, but _my god_ was that funny. I kind of just went “Eh?” and he held it up in the air and started waving it around, grinning like a fool and shouting “dZat, dZat”. > “Yes, Phil, I see that.” 😃 > > bella \*\* You’re never too **young** to get started on a life of crime.😉 ---
**Author:** ![neofishboy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/neofishboy/32/444_2.png) [@neofishboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neofishboy)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/31 "2002-06-27T01:20:02Z")
Assorted doo-dads from restaurants - pepper shakers, candles, those little glass boxes that sugar packets live in… Beer mugs of many types, including a monster 1 Liter… A small, plastic “Shoplifters Will be Prosecuted” sign, and a large, metal “Drug-free School Zone” sign (it was for a scavenger hunt)… Oh, and a spatula. ---
**Author:** ![WSLer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a6a055/32.png) [@WSLer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WSLer)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/32 "2002-06-27T01:21:56Z")
The summer of my junior year in high school, meaning I was going to be a senior, I got a job at a dart Drug store in Rockville, MD. It wasn’t quite the worst job I’ve ever had, but it ranks in the Top 3 with a bullet. Anyway, I got fired for taking money out of the register, (long, long story) and a friend who was working as a cashier at the store told me to wait for a few minutes. He asked what happened and got really pissed off, but I figured that I got off pretty easy. He kept saying, “No, man, that’s fucked up. They have to pay.” So, that night we made up a list of stuff that we wanted and the next day I went in the store and picked up an 85 gallon cooler and started walking around filling it up with stuff. I pretty much cleared out the batteries, and a good bit of the candy aisle. razor blades, cologne, anti-perspirant, soda, chips etc. I couldn’t get any of the “good stuff” like cameras because they were all in a locked glass case. I brought the cooler up to the checkout line where my friend was cashiering and put a pack of gum on top of it. He rang up the gum, I paid for it and then walked out with the gum and the cooler. 3 weeks later the store was closed down.😛 ---
**Author:** ![Booker57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Booker57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Booker57)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/33 "2002-06-27T01:47:35Z")
1987 Mercury Grand Marquis. My ride was broke and so was I. The car belonged to a dealer not a half-mile from my house. Walked up, took the plates off another car, Slim-jimed the door open, tried a \*\* large \*\* ring of keys, found one that worked. Drove the car to where I wanted to go. I abandoned it there and called up the dealer. Two days later it was towed away. No lost sleep over that. ---
**Author:** ![clayton\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@clayton\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clayton_e)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/34 "2002-06-27T02:20:22Z")
“You stole my stapler.” ---
**Author:** ![Fern\_Forest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/71c47a/32.png) [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/35 "2002-06-27T03:43:56Z")
I’m surprised I’m the first doper to admit to swiping porn. From 13 to 16 I must have swiped dozens of Playboy glossies. Wasn’t caught once. Then one day tried to get a candy bar and got busted, arrested. Almost sent to Juvie because my mom was late coming home and they didn’t want to have me spend the night in jail. But I begged and then let me wait for my mom. 6 hours in jail, sigh. I never felt guilty about those. I think I rationalized it as kids vs. adults. I did feel some minor guilt once though. In 5th grade we were sitting in another class (not our own) for some reason. Sitting at a desk not my own I saw a really neat pen inside and I swiped it. Poor other kid. That’s all the stuff I stole physically. I guess that’s not bad for a 27 year old. And since I don’t steal anymore I think I can work it off. ---
**Author:** ![Joyfulgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f04885/32.png) [@Joyfulgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joyfulgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939/36 "2002-06-28T00:13:58Z")
The only thing I’ve ever really stolen was Famous Potato Pete, a sign from a potato display. Me and my boyfriend were walking through the grocery store when we saw a cardboard potato about 3 feet tall wearing a red shirt with “#1” on it, converse all-stars, and doing what appeared to be the hustle. He looked way too cool for a grocery store, so we swiped him. We spent about 2 minutes untaping it from the display (someone had taped it on all sides) and put it on the very bottom compartment of the cart. Walked out of the store with no problems. They had a few more of the signs, so I figured they wouldn’t miss him. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-what-have-you-stolen/115939.md?page=1)