To catch a thief....
 

One of my friggin kis is swiping money from me! :pukeface:

I generally leave my wallet with acash all over the place and never count what I have, just a general idea.

Lately, I have been thinking I am missing some $$$.

100 bill one day, a 20 here and there.

This past weekend I told my wife(she always tells me when she takes money) and explained to her the different times I have been missing some.

Anyway, I started counting every night 3 day ago, on Monday, and wrote the total down prior to sleeping.

Last night, I had $156.00. This morning, I have 116.00

So I have eliminated any friends that come over and narrowed it down to my son and step-son.

I'm more disappointed than upset. I swiped $$ from my parents to, so now I know how they felt.

I just want to stop them before it becomes a habit.

Last night, they were beggin me for $$ to buy Pizza for their friends.

My son I know was broke, becasue if he has it, he spends it. Teh step-son, on the other hand has money saved and will not touch it for food, drink, etc....

I could always start breaking stuff that they treasure until they admit it, then reimburse the innocent one.

I just need to know.

How about an elaborate trap?

Suggestions are welocme and appreciated.

Any ideas on how to pin the culprit down, short of killing them?

Have you actually sat them down and talked to them? Might be a good idea to let them know your suspicions and what will be the consequences if it continues and if they get caught. Seems like some plain simple values need to be redefined.

A nannycam..................a miniture camera pointed on where you leave the money. hooked to a hidden VCR .........................its positive proof............but only show them the proof if they lie about it....I would give them a chance to admit to it when confronted............In a calm manner of course. In this way you don't have to look at everyone as the guilty culprit....2 of the 3 are likely innocent.

I agree about the values being redefined as they are both good kids.

That being said, asking them will probably not work. They'll deny it unless I have proof.

I was thinking that I might take away there favorite things, like Ipods, video games, DVD's, etc... and ban them to their rooms until someone confesses with the threat of destruction to those things if they don't.

Just a thought.

Thanks

Are there any types of video cameras that I can hook up to the cpu via a USB port that tape onto the hard drive?

I usually leave my wallet on my desk and a vcr would be difficult to place in the area w/o raising suspicion.

My wife is completely innocent. She always leaves me notes if she needs petty cash and takes it.

It has to be one of those little bastards that live here.

I've been paying attention lately to the late evening hours(11PM) becasue their friends are usually gone by then, this way i have eliminated them.

They are both up earlier than I am, so I narrowed it down to it having happened this morning. I counted prior to going to bed last night.

I bought a camera on E-bay that was disguised as a cell phone that transmitted the image to a reciever (like a cordless phone) then to TV, VCR etc. Very cool used to catch thief at work. :mad: As I recall it was <$40.
Now I use it to watch the thermometer on the smoker outside :D hooked to input #2 on TV with PIP.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=41969&item=5949706782&rd=1

this will accept any standard spy cam.................. there are a lot of them up on ebay.....

This way you don't bring down your wrath on the wrong people.

it will let you know who to focus on.............if they continue to lie then when all else fails show them...............after a healthy grounding.
best part is it can run 24X7 and recycle the same hard drive space....and no problem forgetting to rewind a tape.

Just empty your wallet every night and leave a note in there saying, you have been caught, there is no money but your fingerprint is here so back away from my moooney. Take this card if I know you will never again do this and lets forget about it. Or I will come after you with a dull knife at night and murder you very slowly and painfully.

cash
 

Thats not cool, im 20 now and when i didnt have a job i would take cash from my parents, now more then a few bucks or there change. I would be pissed, alot of people i know would steel from there parents to buy some drugs. Maybe there smoking the cheeba? I would narrow it down a little more and when you are 100% shure on who it is, i would lay down the the law.

Stealing from parents is way uncool, particularly since you would likely give it to them if they asked........

Get the interface card a spy cam and find out who it is.............lay down the law and make them remember there are consiquinces for their actions.....

Leave some counterfit money.

While the video camera setup would provide positive proof, it's probably not worth the time and effort.

Just get some printer's ink and liberally apply it to about 15 one dollar bills. Put all the bills in the wallet. Leave the wallet in the normal place. When the thief goes through it, there will be a telltale residue on his hands.

If he is quite smart, however, he may find some acetone to remove it before you can confront him.

There may be something better than printer's ink, such as the dye markers that are used to catch bank robbers, however, it might not be so easy to obtain it.

Can't you just put your wallet in a safe place, or are you determined to catch this person? After you were stolen from once, why did you continue to leave it lying around?

becasue he will be looking at both kids with suspician....and end up penalizing the innocent one as well as the guilty one........plus being caught and forced to admit it might straighten out the kid before he does anything worse.

I'm a technology guy and love the high-tech solutions everyone has given. That cellphone camera looks so cool!

Of course, I am here to suggest a "low-tech" way. Setting the ground rules is a great idea (as someone suggested) and I'd obviously try that first.

Mark the bills somehow. Maybe circle the last digit of the serial number or something. It doesn't even have to be hidden -- just so that someone taking the bill wouldn't know it's there.

Wait till a time when money is missing and everyone else has left the house. Go through their wallets and see who has it. Confront them when they return.

OK, maybe going through their wallets is a bad idea. Instead, maybe you could casually "ask them for change" or some other reason to see the money before they leave the house.

Maybe point out that every $20 bill has the number 5 as the 1st digit of the serial number (or some other useless made-up trivial fact). This will make them open their wallet to check if theirs do too, so you can see the bills.

Neal

I'm gonna take a serious note on this. As was brought up earlier, this can be a sign of drug abuse. If that is the case, the missing cash is the least of the problems. Do the electronic thing and find out who. Then find out why. If the person is just being dumb, great. If something more is going on, ya gotta get 'em help fast. Either one of them show any changes in behavior lately?
Good luck and I hope it's just a kid being dumb.

You can do this easily if you have a USB or Firewire camcorder and there is a ton of free software.

Mark all the bills so you could identify them somewhat easily, then go through there wallet.

Put a micro switch under the wallet. Hook this switch up to lights and sirens at a loud volume. Check the suspects underwear :D

If you dont mind ruining your wallet, you can always lace it with diesel oil.

How much earlier do the sons get up? Might it not be worth the trouble to set your alarm a few minutes earlier? (then again, they could be getting up at 2am to pilfer your wallet)

Whatever you do, I hope you figure out who it is, and why they are taking it. Then again, you could always "get even" and take merchandise of the same value from his posessions (secretly, of course) - see how he likes to be thieved.

Have you tried asking them? I would sit them down and not let them get up until the guilty one fesses up.

I have not tried asking them yet. i wanted to be sure that it was them and not a friend of theirs.

My son gets up earlier than everyone else cause he has to walk the dog then walk to his friends house for a ride to school.

The stepson wakes up with just enough time to brush his teeth and run to the bus stop.

I think that I have narrowed it down further to my son this afternoon. He was dozing in the famly room and I peeked in his wallet. There was 38 bucks in there.

Remember I mentioned earlier that he was broke yesterday and wanted to buy pizza with his friends.

I am missing 40. 40 minus crap he bought at school is 38.00

I think it is important to catch him. Confronting one or both without proof will let them know that I know, and they will stop and say, dang, he does count his money.

Where/what how? Is it difficult?

I really want to catch them in the act. It will be more fun that way.

I forgot to mention that I was going to mark the bills last night but forgot. Had I done that, I would have all the proof I need with the cash in his wallet.

Because it's my house and I should be abe to leave my wallet where I damn well please w/o having to worry if my own kids are stealing from me.

Basically if your camcorder has a usb or firewire just plug it in and google webcam software, you set the "hot zone and if theres any movement it starts the recording.

http://www.digi-watcher.com/

Do either of them ask for money for legitimate things? ie., new shoes, Dolphin's hat etc? If so then there may be something else going on.

I would leave a note saying "Son we need to talk. Dad."

I like this one, except I'd not bother with the threat.

Or even simpler you might just get the family together and gently tell everybody dishonesty hurts your heart, especially within your family. If the thief has any interity left, that should help reinforce it. Then NEVER again leave money where it can be a temptation. It's certainly not your fault that the thief took the money, but we don't leave money where folks will be tempted, do we?

They both have littel part-time jobs and they don't lack any necessities plus all the usual spoiled kids $hit from the modern era.

Now that they are working, if they want any extra stuff, we make them pay for it. If it's beyond their means, we offer to help if they do this or that.

My son is the one with the expensive tastes. He loves to go to the mall with his friends, hang out and he likes to spend money. Sort of like how I was and still am.

Botnst, you are correct that I should not leave my money laying around tempting people.

After I find out, it will be put away in my room, away from prying eyes.

Get a lockbox.......shame you have to do this in your own home....but you have to do what you have to do.

If you have a computer that runs MAC OS X there is a program out called SecuritySpy it free, and it's available from the apple website www.apple.com it's motion activated, and works with any usb or firewire cammera. Hope this helps, I'm going to give it a try and see if I can catch my sister stealing anything of mine (I know she does, I just need a little proof)

spencerbandit88

either that or you can put your walet in a room that has a closet you can hide in and watch for them, and to make things interesting you can introduce them to paintballing at the sametime ;) I was going to do that with my sister and her friends but I really don't have much of a closet.

I was thinking of trying some of that semi permanent ink or maybe some of that itchy powder when he grabs a a roll of bogus bills.

I could sacrifice a couple of twentys and put the itchy powder on the top two and reuse it until I nab him scratching his eyeballs out.

There's gpt to be a way.

I marked some bills tonite and left 90.00 right by this keyboard. We'll see what happens.

I may go to a spystore tomorrow and see if I can't get any ideas.

Well the 90.00 was intact.

After swiping 40.00 the night before I guess they are pretty fat right now.

Yes, well, there is honor among theives. You don't steal money unless you need it. :D

How old? Nobody has asked the age of these kids yet. I am suprised. a 13 year old and a 17 year old stealing money are two very different things in my opinion.

we had this prob. with our oldest (now moved out). everything of value went into the gun safe (it's a big one) especially the pain meds. he still stuggles with his demons.

pizza
 

Even when i had money i would still try to get my parents to pay for things and still do. so just because he "said" he didnt have money, might just mean he knows you will pay for it and he saves 20 bucks. You need to put more money then that in you wallet, some odd number say 143 dollars have a few ones, fives, ten, and some twenties, out of order. I wouldnt take money out of a wallet that had 4 20's and a ten to obvious.

My son is 15, will be 16 in April. Stepson truned 18 in September.

Well, I finally got him with some marked bills in his wallet he swiped this afternoon and he denied it at first until I showed him the marked bills and he came clean, which I doubted cause he's so stubborn.

He was embarrased and surprised although he's like me and being apologetic is not in him.

I had a long talk with him, discussing the virtues of honesty and trust and took away his beloved IPOD as payment and punishment along with a "no friends allowed over" until further notice edict. Plus I got my money back as well.

I was so pissed that I couldn't think straight and perhaps left some punishment on the table. I left it open to change when I calmed down.

He's very lucky that he fessed up pretty quickly or he would be missing teeth right about now.

Thanks

which boy did it? the 15/16 or the 17/18?

The 15/16.

I'll have another talk with him today after school.

The irony is that he got the highest midterm exam score in the entire school in language arts, which he had benn only getting a C. All the rest of his grades are A's and B's.

Well like they say the first step to curing a problem is admission you have one.....or did it......If I had done the same to my parrents I would likely still be grounded.......and I'm 43 now.

In my opinion you did good by leaving some punishment on the table......gives him more to worry about/think about.

money
 

How much money did you have in your wallet when he took some?

then you have some time to work Plant, good luck to you sir. from one who knows, this could be a rough ride........i'd find out where the money went. now that the kat is out of the bag, he should be willing to demonstrate where it all went.....VERIFY WHERE IT ALL WENT.

i say this because my son had a drug prob. that is where the money went. if your boy has that prob., then get real help. we did not recognize the severity of the draw of that culture to a minor, and we lost him to himself. he still suffers and is getting no younger...good luck again.

I left 143.00 and had 93.00 2 hours later.

He didn't spend any of it, except for 3 dollars at school.

He likes to go out w/friends from grammar school and like a lot of kids he likes to show off.

He's in his room sleeping now, I imagine he's not very happy with himself. He went out looking for a job today and was surprised that no one jumped thru hoops to hire him.

Thanks for all the responses.

i can just about garauntee hes trying to buy pot with the money....theres very few kids 15-17yrs old who dont smoke weed, at least around here....ill bet the reason he hadnt spent it is because he hadnt talked to the dope man yet....maybe hes not...maybe hes just taking it because he can....a wallet left out is like an open invitation to a 15 yr old kid, no matter what kind of values they have....but ill just say this, dont be the fool and think that this is all there could be to it....i didnt do any drugs until my senior year in high school, had never even seen pot until then....but mannnny of my friends did it and they stole money from thier parents like crazy....i remained friend with a lot of them up until 22-23....two of them are cokeheads, another likes the sauce and has 2 DUIs to his name....im just saying, if your son has an addictive personality i would beat the natural born ***** out of him if i found out he was smoking weed....i dont think weed is bad for you at all, i smoke it almost daily...but i do think that if you have an addictive personality, weed wont be enough for you after some time...youll go on to coke and lord knows what else...but coke is usually the next in line....if coke gets ahold of your son, youll never have a good nights sleep again...it will absolutely consume him....while you still have control of him, you need to instill the right things in him so that maybe he will make the right choices when you dont have control of him....good luck to you, plantman....i hope for you that you got this nipped in the bud

To add a little closure to this post, my son was really bummed for 2 days after I caught him. Would eat very littel and stayed in his room.

On the 3rd day he tells me that he wanted to apologize and was waiting for a chance to tell me when I wasn't busy.

So he apologized and said it won't happen again.

I asked him if he really meant it and he said yes, which I believed. I then told him he could have his Ipod back and he declined, saying I should keep it.

:)

Sounds like you've got a pretty decent kid there; glad to hear that things worked themselves out.

Thanks.

I have been fortunate that all of my kids(My son, stepson and niece) are very good hearted and don't seem to have any malice in them.

Like me when I was a kid. :rolleyes: