Bold as brass.

Some people are bold as brass…stupidly…


Peyton came in to my office to report that his brand new, dark green, neoprene, Carhart jacket was missing and he has seen another student, Richard, wearing it today. He said he remembers taking it off at the construction site last Wednesday and he must have left it there then, but he had to be out of school Thursday and Friday. He said he looked for it Monday and Tuesday, but didn't see it and then saw another student, Richard, wearing it today.

Peyton admitted that it could be a different jacket, but he knows he left it at the school’s construction job site and he has that class 3rd and 4th periods while Richard has the advanced construction class 2nd and 3rd periods. He said he confronted Richard this morning and said he thought Richard was wearing his jacket. Richard adamantly denied it and told him his girlfriend gave it to him as a gift. Peyton said there is certainly a chance the girlfriend gave it to him, but it was a very expensive jacket, and it seems like a pretty extravagant gift! He told me his mom has a receipt for the jacket, but because it is so new, there are no distinguishing marks such as a stain or tear, etc…

My counterpart, Jenn, went to Richard’s classroom to bring him down to the office. He was wearing the jacket. He was immediately red in the face as he sat in Jenns’s office with Jenn and me. Jenn questioned him as to where he got the jacket. He recounted the situation a few days ago when Peyton confronted him about it, and said Peyton was accusing him of taking his jacket and how Payton was really insistant this was his jacket, but that was not true. He said his ex-girlfriend came over to his house on Tuesday, March 16 and stayed for about an hour. As she was leaving, she gave him the jacket as a gift. When asked why, Richard said it was because he had been mad at her and she was trying to get back on his good side. He reported that she often gives gifts. When asked who the ex-girlfriend was, he said she goes to a rural high school in a surrounding small town and her name was Ann Liston.

While Jenn kept Richard in her office, I went to my office and called Ann’s school to talk to her principal. The principal was out so I left a message for a counselor to call us back. While Jenn had Richard in her office, she asked him several times in different ways how he got the jacket... she implored him to tell the truth... she asked again how he got it... it was always the same story. She then told him we would need to keep the jacket until we had completed our investigation. He complied. She asked if we could hold his cell phone until we completed the investigation (so he couldn’t contact Ann and get her up to speed on his story). He informed us his cell phone had been taken away by his mom, so he didn’t have one. We asked Richard if he could stick around while we completed the investigation and he said, “sure – I just want to get to the bottom of this – this is crazy that Peyton thinks this is his jacket!” I took Richard to a seat down the hall, out of earshot of Jenn’s office so we could use the speakerphone.

Mrs. Smith, the counselor at Ann’s school called back and placed us on hold while she got Ann out of class. We put Ann on speakerphone and interviewed her. We asked if she has purchased a dark green, neoprene, Carhart jacket recently. She said no. We asked if she has been aware of anyone she knows wearing one. She said no. We asked if she knew Richard. She said yes. We asked when the last time she had seen him was and she said three weeks ago or so. We asked her to verify that she did not go to his house on Tuesday, March 16 and she verified that she had not.

We dismissed Ann and spoke with Mrs. Smith. We asked if Ann is a credible person. She assured us she was and said Ann was at softball practice on Tuesday evening. She said she has never had any reason to doubt Ann’s honesty.

We brought Richard back in and informed him that we spoke with Ann. Before we could say anything else, he immediately stated that he didn’t “get” the jacket, he “found” the jacket in the construction site’s shop. He said it didn’t belong to him. We let him know that the school police officer was out of the building, but we will be turning this matter over to him. He hung his head and acted like we were unreasonably targeting him.

Bold as brass.