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January 12, 2010

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No home run for cheeky thefts

By Wang Xiang | January 12, 2010, Tuesday | Print Edition

THE nagging ... day and night ... find a husband .... do this ... do that ... why can't you be more like your kid sister? What does a 20-something girl do to get out of this rut?

Aha. Commit a crime and make it a certainty to get caught. Some time in a detention house. Three square meals a day. And blissful peace and quiet.

A 29-year-old woman, surnamed Song, in east China's Shandong Province decided to turn this daydream into reality and it almost worked.

Song stole more than 1,600 yuan (US$235) worth of goods from a supermarket hoping for a term of confinement to escape the nagging.

Song was once in a serious relationship for five years but her family did not approve of their marriage because the man was too poor.

The couple finally broke up last summer, thanks no end to her overbearing parents, Xinhua news agency reported yesterday.

After Song's younger sister wed last autumn, the parents took on a new mission - to talk Song into an "ideal marriage" as soon as possible.

Song said she could not bear their daily badgering and believed living in a detention house had to be an improvement. She figured her parents would be subject to strict visiting hours, cutting way down on carping time.

Take 1. She stole a chicken leg worth 4.5 yuan from a supermarket in Shandong's Linyi City. She walked out bold as brass and undetected. Drat!

Take 2. She stole 256 yuan worth of shrimps and chocolates the next day and ... deja vu. She exited scot free.

Take 3. She finally got caught when she tried to take 3.5 kilograms of nuts from the supermarket on December 5.

Song quickly confessed to police that she stole six times from the supermarket in three days but only ate the first chicken leg.

Song's parents offered to pay 2,000 yuan in compensation to the supermarket. Song refused the offer, saying she preferred incarceration to going home with her family.

Song's dream scheme, alas, came unstuck. Prosecutors dismissed the case because of the small value of the goods in question and the fact that it was her first offense.

Nation


 

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