Dont get all uncool and heavy, the guy was more than likely insured and like I said, I do feel bad about it still - 20 years later.
Don't want to derail thread and come across as holier than thou (because I ain't) but if I had done something like that, the guilt would fester over the years and really affect things like my confidence etc. I would at least seek a way to maybe contact the guy, see how he's doing, maybe redeem myself in any way possible. If the guy can't be found at least you know you tried and can move on positively.
unless he was driving/operating illegally it would be insured.
Hek it might hjave given the guy the lump sum of cash to go and do what he wanted to rather than being stuck in a job he didn't really like.
True,
could of happened, perhaps a blessing in disguise, but that's speculation. It may of, just as likely, have been the opposite.
Anyway my turn wall-o-text© time
back in my youth in South Africa I used to shoplift (stick it to the man per se), only small things like razors, batteries, eventually moved onto CD's from equavalent HMV type stores (Musica). The first time I tried from a store similar to Tesco's (Checkers) I was bust by security, father called in etc. Doodoo'd myslf but nothing came of it, I was just banned from the store and if I got caught again then police would be involved.
So now I'm trying to keep my nose clean. Around 2 months later a group of my mates decide we'd go to a camp site on the beach for the weekend and just have boyish fun (play tennis, braai, general 14yr old fun with no parents involved)
So the first night we go exploring the campsite and at reception there's a big building that they have wedding receptions in and one was currently being held, so I decide 'hey they may have alcohol we could nick! teehee'
So me being
big man goes around the back, crawls under patio furniture, around the back of the bar - friends onlooking from the window.
As I get to the bar, about to reach up for a bottle of amarula (baileys equavalent) the security guard walks past on his way to pick up extra beverages from the freezer - I duck behind the bar counter amd the antispill flooring makes a slight noise, security guard hears this and vears off course and sees me hiding behind the bar counter - busted! - friends at this point leg it back to the campsite.
I'm now having to explain my story, I have no shoes on and my feet are dirty, I'm in shorts and a tshirt, to them I must have looked like a squatter!
They call the police
I am sat there being watched by 2 security gaurds with occasional people from the wedding reception peeking in to see the
miscreant.
1 hour (felt like 4 hours) later the police arrive with.....assault rifles*
- queue extra mess on pants!
anyway blah blah, long story of trying to explain that I was with some mates and decided on my own to venture off and nick some alcohol, gave false school details so they wouldn't go to my headmaster and perhaps link my previous shoplifting warning etc.
While they were interrogating me the other police officer went to my mates camp spot to verify my side of the story with theirs - thank God they said 'officer he just walked off, don't know what happened' phew it matched with my story
End of it was they would do a stock take and if anything was missing then I would be prosecuted - turned out everything was accounted for - lucky escape could have changed my whole life for just trying to be
mainbok (popular)
*trust me when I say, when you are 14 and police exit armoured vehicles and walk in with assault rifles looking for a supposed criminal, you kinda stress a bit, I acted cool
but inside I was a bricking
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