The rules change when it's your kid

i-Phone

Against my better judgement and because the other parent was doing the buying....

my middle son got one of these for Christmas.

He was told that he couldn't bring it to school. Period. BUT...like all good (ha) parents, we buckled and said that he could as long as he brought it in to my office before PE.

Because everyone knows that PE is the hotbed of theft, correct?

You know where this is going already right?

So, I have been out of my office in testing HELL for the past two weeks. Before I moved campus locations, I made sure that everyone left in the office would be available to keep his phone in their desks during 4th period. He knew this.

Yesterday, he decided that he didn't have time to bring it to the office. He was talking to Lauren on the phone and took it into PE, in plain sight. He tucked it into his backpack, got dressed and took the pack out to the gym like they need to do (because the lockers are too small....).

After class he reached in to get his phone and BINGO! It was gone.

He absolutely freaked and went to his teacher.

At some point two other students went to the teacher also and told them that so and so took the phone and that they saw him with it.

I get a call in testing hell, "I got two names for you about who might have stolen Jeff's phone..."

"WHAT?! What do you mean Jeff's stolen phone? WHAT!??!" (For what I really sounded like think the Mom who just got told her son said the 'F---' word on Christmas Story and you get the picture)

So the saga of phone recovery begins....

At our school if you lose a phone, oh well. You bring it at your own risk.

BUT...if you are beloved employee, like moi, the rules change.

Luckily for me, I work with the Police department every day. I had the names of witnesses, we called two of them in, one lied and said he knew nothing about it. The other one gave up the name of the thief (who is conveniently absent today for the first time all year...) and that the first student actually was holding the phone for the thief.

Officer Bell, my hero, called the first kid in and read him his rights. It was awesome. He then proceeded to tell him that he had been identified as having the phone in his possession, that the parents of the owner of the phone were absolutely going to file and press charges against him as an accessory. It would be a FELONY on his record. This, officer Bell said, was punishable by 10-15 days at the Boys Ranch and 30 days of ankle monitoring. Was there anything he wanted to say? (it was totally beyond awesome..........).

I wanted to fly over the counter and totally smack the kid for lying to me earlier. That's against the law, dang it.

We know who stole the phone. Officer Bell is pretty certain that we will get it back somehow.

We also know who will not be seeing his soon-to-be-returned phone for a while. It will sit quietly turned off, unused, for quite awhile.

Mother does know best.