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Hi, new here and hoping for some advice, please. My daughter (15) and her friend (16) were caught shoplifting yesterday, stopped leaving one store but with items belonging to three stores in their bags. Representatives of the other two stores were called to the one they were caught in.
Take it as read that I am appalled by this, my daughter is upset and remorseful; I'm not condoning this at all.
The police were called and as I was out of town, I had to get her dad to go to the store. He thinks he perhaps signed something but is unsure, he said it was all a rush. The policeman is calling at our house later today.
All I know so far is that my daughter is to be banned from the stores (one woman said for life, the police said for a year) and she is being asked to write an apology letter to each store. I have no idea what to expect from the police visit. Will she be asked to accept a caution and if so, what would be the consequences of this?
The items were all recovered. Additionally, the girls had both bought an item from two of the stores involved, and had the receipts for those. They were told to leave those together with the receipts, so I'm assuming the stores are planning to keep (and probably resell) them,
Also, am I best to go along with whatever the policeman insists on, or am I going to make the whole situation worse by voicing some concerns about how things were handled yesterday? My daughter is still a child, and while she's done wrong, I'm not happy that the security guard, especially, was quite threatening. He snatched her bag and searched it without asking (I'm aware from other threads on here that he should have asked for her consent), he demanded her address and date of birth (I'm not happy about him having this information, in my opinion if the police were to be called then they should have been the ones privy to this), and he threatened that both girls would be (strip)searched when a female police officer arrived, and was backed up in this by a female co-worker. This to a 15 year old who was, at that point, on her own other than her friend.
Any ideas what I can expect from the police visit today, and what I should be letting my daughter agree to in terms of writing letters, accepting cautions etc? I'm worried sick over this. And sorry for the length of this post.
(I have also read the threads on RLP, I'm assuming we can expect to receive letters from them in the imminent future.)
Take it as read that I am appalled by this, my daughter is upset and remorseful; I'm not condoning this at all.
The police were called and as I was out of town, I had to get her dad to go to the store. He thinks he perhaps signed something but is unsure, he said it was all a rush. The policeman is calling at our house later today.
All I know so far is that my daughter is to be banned from the stores (one woman said for life, the police said for a year) and she is being asked to write an apology letter to each store. I have no idea what to expect from the police visit. Will she be asked to accept a caution and if so, what would be the consequences of this?
The items were all recovered. Additionally, the girls had both bought an item from two of the stores involved, and had the receipts for those. They were told to leave those together with the receipts, so I'm assuming the stores are planning to keep (and probably resell) them,
Also, am I best to go along with whatever the policeman insists on, or am I going to make the whole situation worse by voicing some concerns about how things were handled yesterday? My daughter is still a child, and while she's done wrong, I'm not happy that the security guard, especially, was quite threatening. He snatched her bag and searched it without asking (I'm aware from other threads on here that he should have asked for her consent), he demanded her address and date of birth (I'm not happy about him having this information, in my opinion if the police were to be called then they should have been the ones privy to this), and he threatened that both girls would be (strip)searched when a female police officer arrived, and was backed up in this by a female co-worker. This to a 15 year old who was, at that point, on her own other than her friend.
Any ideas what I can expect from the police visit today, and what I should be letting my daughter agree to in terms of writing letters, accepting cautions etc? I'm worried sick over this. And sorry for the length of this post.
(I have also read the threads on RLP, I'm assuming we can expect to receive letters from them in the imminent future.)
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