"The Burglary," Part II

Okay... I guess I could have written about this much sooner... like, later that morning... but, I didn't...

This is actually a pretty long story, but I'll try to keep it not too long-ish...

So, after I was broken into, I decided that when the sun came up, I was going to go see if I could maybe find my wallet in one of the dumpsters or trash cans, nearby... So, I went out and had a look around... I decided to have a look at the back door screen that was ripped open to gain access to my back door and all that... took a couple pictures of it... and when I was coming back down the steps, I noticed something unusual... looked like drag marks... Well, the intruder person took a HUGE plastic Rubbermaid tub (that I had used to bring down some appliances and such when I moved in) and put all the stuff they stole into it... So it made sense... It also told me that there was only one person doing the burglary... It was easily a two-person sized tub... so one person would have to drag it (two people could have easily carried it). The grass had been cut the day before and was extremely short, to the point of exposing the soil underneath in some uneven places)... This helped to make the drag marks a little more conspicuous... So, I followed the drag marks around the back of my nextdoor neighbor's house... and... lo and behold... the drag marks stopped... right at his back porch... There was a trash can between his house and the building next to it... I lifted it up a little bit and could easily tell that it had been in place for quite a while (the grass underneath was a different color (gotta love that chlorophyl stuff) and there were no other marks on the ground where the can could have been sitting before the burglar would have moved it)... There was no way to get that huge tub around the trash can... and the drag marks abruptly stopped at the back porch... I had my suspicions about him as soon as I realized that it had happened (his blinds are always up, but every blind in the house was all the way down when I came home, obviously so no one would look in and see him sorting through my stuff).

I took some more pictures of all of it and then called a former neighbor of mine who is the head of the detective bureau here in town... He and his partner showed up and walked around the houses... I took it upon myself to point out the drag marks and when I did, I was asked to go to the office next door and "hang out" for a while... Within about an hour, I had most of my stuff back... no cash, though... and a few other things that I didn't realize were stolen were still inside (which were later taken out of the house by the kid's mother who came down to clean it out after he was arrested)...

I'm a little pissed that the landlady let the mother in to empty the house out knowing that there was still some of my property inside... so I'll probably never see it, again... I really love that razor, too... not to mention a couple digital recorders and some awesome gloves...

When the police were taking him out of the house in cuffs, I was nextdoor at the business, sorting through all my stuff that they had recovered... The kid stops... looks at me... and says, "Tony, I stole all your stuff..." I kinda laughed and was like, "Really?!?! No way!"

He had a drug problem (that the VA fed for him every month with mass quantities of painkillers, nerve pills, etc.)... The night before, I had come home from work and saw him passed out on his bed... I gave a doubletake and thought he was dead... after I figured out that he was, in fact, still breathing, I went in and fixed my dinner and was walking back through my hallway and saw him trying to stand up off his bed... and failing miserably... I clicked off my hall light and sat there for a minute and watched... He probably fell over four or five times before he made it to his feet for more than ten seconds... I knew something was up, at that point... I thought about maybe saying something to the landlady, but I figured as long as he kept that mess to himself, I wasn't going to put my nose into it... But yeah... end of the month... no job, no money, no dope... and judging from the fact that he emptied out my fridge and pantry, probably no food, either.

It just burns me up to find out that a neighbor would do something stupid like this... I mean, from the first day I was moving in, I knew he was sketchy... but we were always very friendly to eachother (I'm a nice guy, y'know?)... If he would have needed money, I could have just loaned him some... it's not like I didn't know where he was to find him, y'know? But to break into my house and steal my stuff? Lower than low... I mean, I had a "best friend" who decided to steal or attempt to steal every girlfriend I ever had in my life (I had always adopted a philosophy that if the girls were dumb enough to fall for his line of crap, then they weren't worth my time in the first place - the friendship abrupty ended when he decided to scam on the wrong girl... who also fell for it hook, line and sinker)... and he was low (well, besides some of the most ridiculous behavior I've ever seen from people (with regards to that ex)... he actually broke into my old house a few times, himself (caught him once, even), looking for stupid shit... I wouldn't say he was necessarily "stealing stuff," but rather than just asking me about something, he waited for me to not be home and went in and "borrowed it," instead)... okay... so he was really low, too (it's okay, though - he's reaping what he's sown to this day)... but even that dork couldn't touch the sliminess of the little pilljunkie nextdoor neighbor chump.

I don't hate the neighbor kid, or anything... I just think he's an idiot.