My 11 year old son was at the park last night skateboarding with his friend. They saw two other kids break into the community centre building and went over to see what was going on.
My son recognized one of the kids. My son’s friend - the same one with him at the park - has a brother who hangs around with the guy.
So after realizing what was going on my son and his friend high-tailed it out of there and went back to the friend’s house whereby the friend informed his mother what they just witnessed. His friend’s mother brushed it off and said she’d call the parents of the vandal and let them know what happened. She wasn’t going to call the police because as far as she was concerned her son and mine were just as culpable for being idle witnesses to said break and entry.
My son didn’t like that response and came home. He told my wife the story and the police were immediately called. (I was out at the time but got the story by cell phone.) My son was scared that he might be implicated, but my wife assured him that if he was telling the truth then he’s absolutely not guilty of anything.
I came home to two police cars pulling in my driveway ahead of me. I got out and said “Well, this should get the neighbours talking.” They both chuckled, we introduced ourselves and I invited them in.
My son recounted the whole story, complete with which kid was wielding the axe, a description of the dirt bike and four wheeler the kids were driving, and the name of one of the perpetrators. Much thanks were given by the police, and my son was asked to send an email to one of the officers describing what he had just said.
After the police left my son hopped on the computer and started his draft email. He was empowered with his new crime-fighting duties and actually said something like “those guys were nice. I want to be a cop when I grow up now!”
All those years of explaining to him who actually ends up paying for vandalism to public buildings paid off. Well, along with teaching him the difference between right and wrong. Now if only his friend’s mom felt the same way.
Congrats to your wife for taking charge and making the responsible move. This set a good example for all the kids involved. The other mother was looking for a way to make the situation go away. Shame on her for the suggestion that your child had the least responsibility. Losers and wrong doers frequently use this move of shifting blame to others. If the other person is weak, sometime the strategy works for them. Too bad the police can’t(won’t) bring a charge of her harboring a criminal.
His friend’s mom is an idiot. I can’t even figure out what her logic was. He was supposed to confront them? What good would that do? The break-in had already occurred.
And the kids who did the break-in had an axe, which could easily be used as a weapon. Confronting an armed person when you are unarmed is not a real smart move.
I don’t think that’s it. That was given as a reason the son recognized the guy. The son’s friend’s mother seemed to be more concerned that the son and the friend witnessed the break-in but didn’t intervene, and thus the police would consider them to be tacitly abetting the crime.
Which makes absolutely no sense, since telling the police is the exact opposite of tacitly abetting. In her world every witness to a crime who does not intervene is abetting said crime? I’m guessing the crime rate might rise a wee tad if such were the case.
Back when I was a crook I didn’t like vandals, and would’ve called the cops on them, like the boy in this story did. Unless it’s the whole a criminal calling the cops on another criminal bit, then yea, I was being a hypocrit then.
Good on the lot of you - your son did the right thing, your wife did the right thing and you’ve obviously both instilled a strong sense of ethics in him.
After school tonight my son went down the street to his friend’s place again. Turns out the police visited them last night after leaving our house: no mystery since my son provided all the names he knew from the ordeal.
So, friend’s mom lays into my 11 year old for having his parents call the cops! She believed this was only going to get the boys who did it in major trouble, and that the punishment should have been left up to the parents. Let’s see; two kids about 16 years old break into a community centre with an axe, looking to steal anything of value, and causing hundreds of dollars of damage to a building funded by the community and staffed by volunteers and you don’t think the cops should be called? Would these kids move on next to homes? Banks?
I’ll tell you, if the cops showed up at my door and my kid was the one being ratted on I would be completely on the side of the cops. I’d probably call the other parents and thank them for it!
Should be fun around here for a while. And let’s hope retaliation isn’t involved.