Dear Charlie,
I live in a nice neighborhood, and am friends with some of the people on my street. There is a little boy who lives a few houses down, whose mother is a friend of mine. We have had lunch together a couple times with some other ladies in the neighborhood. Her little boy is about 12 years old and he is very nice from what I can tell. He has a lot of friends and is always playing. While I was walking my dog, I saw him stealing a bike in a nearby neighborhood. He was with a couple other boys and they were looking out for him. He had tools to break the lock off the bike and successfully got away with it. They were being so obvious and loud it was hard not to hear them. What should I do with this information?
-Neighborly Witness
Dear Neighborly Witness,
I think it’s good to examine all the options here because there are several ways you could approach this. Some people believe in putting the smack down on kids and biting it in the butt when they start to behave delinquently. A young criminal minded kid can easily evolve into an adult criminal mind if not corrected. A lot of kids like this are neglected or abused in their homes. However, kids do crazy things all the time. If a kid doesn’t learn that there are repercussions for their actions at an early age, he may become too comfortable and get into real trouble when he’s older. Therefor a lesson is in order here, it's just a matter of how to deliver that lesson. You don’t want to give him such a rude awakening as an introductory lesson in the laws of life that it ruins him. How you handle this could impact the rest of his life. Children are very vulnerable, and easily influenced. Due to this fact, I believe in treating them with “kid gloves” and sensitivity. Life gets more complicated and difficult as we get older. I feel that kids deserve to learn easier and gentler lessons, because it's their introduction to life. There's so much they don't know and so much they are not accountable for. God forbid you got the cops involved, because that can be a traumatizing experience (depending on the cop). You would be amazed at how some cops treat children in situations like this. It can also become a self-fulfilled prophecy, because cops sometimes label children as bad or make them feel so convicted that they live up to those labels and bad feelings as adults. I believe in giving people, especially children, the benefit of the doubt and a chance to learn or change. Kids have been doing naughty things since the beginning of time. It's part of being a kid. If you don't get caught, you may try to do it again or you may be grateful and never do it again. If you do get caught, it could be a valuable lesson or a life label that is hard to shed. Perhaps he’s going down a certain path right now that is not good, but he still has time to turn around and make things right. It’s hard to know a kid socially or tell if he is a bully amongst his peers or not. Since you don’t really know the kid, bringing this to his mother’s attention will mean that she will discipline him to her as she sees fit. It’s up to you as to how proactive you are willing to be. You may not want to be involved, but you already are because of what you saw. That makes you responsible for taking action. Ignoring the situation and staying out of it entirely is not proactive. I think you saw this for a reason, and now it’s up to you to do the right thing. If you have a personal relationship with the boy, or are his friend, you could approach him directly and tell him what you witnessed. Try to make him comfortable talking to you and let him know that he can trust you, before you talk to him. Don’t be judgmental, just state the facts. He will probably be more open to receiving your input, if you are on friendly terms with him, rather than approaching him as a practical stranger. Who knows what’s going on with him? There could be a hundred reasons as to why he is acting this way, depending on his influences. It doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with his family or home life. He could be in a bad circle of friends who pressures him, or he could be bullied by someone older. You could be a positive impact on his life if you went to him and told him that he should return the bike, or else he gives you no choice other than to tell his parents what you saw. Most likely, he will not want that and be grateful you are giving him this chance. Also, ask him why he did it and tell him what can happen to people who do things like that. I know a woman who wanted to discipline her son so badly, that she took him to a prison to show him where he was headed if he didn’t straighten out. That boy is a lawyer today. I think that confronting the boy is a good route to go, because then you offer him the rare opportunity to make it right. You can't force him to change or do the right thing, you can only try to make a positive impact. If you have no children of your own, this will be a practice run in parenting for you…
