what do you do when a child steals?

Question

I have a neice who is ten. she has been stealing money from her mom for quite some time. it started with a dollar here then the amounts started going up. last week she stole $150. my sister was frantic because she thought she had misplaced it and was becoming irresponsible. all week long the kids asked to go for dinner, and she told them she had no money to do this. she had no money for gas, groceries. nothing. now my neice is sitting there not saying a word. we went to the mall, and she had some birthday money left, next thing we know she is spending quite a large amount of money, when asked she lied and said the $50 bill was what the lady gave her back in change. that was a lie. after me standing over her, she finally told the truth and has been grounded. how do we deal with this stealing and lying from a ten year old?

Answer 1

i hate to admit it but i did this at a younger age i think i was 6 when i stole twenty dollars from my moms purse. its not a lot of money and i had no idea how much it was. i took it to school with me to buy icecream and was surprised when the lunch lady gave me back the change. my mom found the money in my pockets of my book bag and asked where i got it. i told her i took it for icecream but the lunch lady gave me alot more then i took. i was grounded for a week and was not allowed icecream money for two weeks. your niece is older then i was and knew what she did was really wrong and then just sat there and watched as her mother was frantic about it. she needs to be punished. take her to the local police station have an officer tell her what would happen if she stole in the real world. have him show her the jail cell and tell her thats where she will end up. that should scare her straight. other then that she should be grounded. she should have to return whatever she bought from the mall and she should not be allowed allowance or anything else for at least a month. and she should have to do chores around the house to earn what she took. at a dollar a chore she should be cleaning for a while. good luck.

Answer 2

Start by having your sister put her sister out of sight and out of reach. It's sad that she should have to do so in her own home, but her daughter cannot be allowed to go on stealing from her, obviously. Anything that she bought with the stolen money that is able to be returned should be. Anything else should be confiscated and not given back. I would suggest that it be donated to charity or something similar. Any allowance that she gets as well as lunch money should be stopped. Let her take lunch from home. I wouldn't' give her any additional money at all at this time. Assign her chores to do around the house and assign an amount to each one. When she has 'paid back' the full amount that she stole (either through chores + lunch money + allowance or just through chores) then she can begin receiving money for lunch and an allowance (personally, I'd reduce the amount she got for an allowance) again. Over time, if she proved that she could be trusted, then she could go back to getting the full allowance. If not, I would warn her that she would have to go back to 'repaying' what she stole and that she ran the risk of losing an allowance all together.

Answer 3

I would take away things that mean alot to her and tell her you are going to sell them to make up for all of the money she has stolen. Cd's, movies, clothes, anything that means alot to her. Then she would be doing alot of chores like cleaning the kitchen, bathroom anything that would be hard work. She needs to understand how it feels to have to work hard for the money that she is taking. When she has completed a room then tell her that you will repay her with the Cd's or whatever it is that means the most to her. If she learns the value of a dollar .. then it will stop. Also I would make her write a report about stealing and why she thought it was necessary for her to do so. This will help you understand where the problem may lie. Good luck.

Answer 4

I think her mom should make her do all the things she prevented by stealing that money. She should fill the gas tank, buy a meal for the family (better yet cook a meal for the family), she should learn what it means to prepare a meal and help out. She should understand that money was there for specific needs. She should also learn that if she does it again there will be a more serious consequence like taking away something that she loves (TV, video games, phone privledges). If you want to be harder on her than that, make her return what she bought with the money. That would only be fair.

Answer 5

It would be just like if I caught her stealing from a store, she'd have to give back the stolen item & apologize, or pay for it & apologize. In this case, would make her pay the money back. She's 10, so you'd have to find resonable 10 year old jobs/chores to make this happen. Stick to your guns, and don't give in and enable her. She's got to learn it because if she steals from someone else, she may not get the second chance you can give her. Another possibility for a 10 year old is to make her do volunteer hours and gage how much per hour she can "earn" towards paying you back. Also, many counties have programs that can scare her into seeing what will happen if she continues. I would try to nip it in the bud.

Answer 6

Discipline...Ground her...as in punishment...Take away her priviledges...TV/Computer.Her mother should also make her do chores around the house as a way to pay the money back.Keep her from going anywhere except to and from school for a week or two...If she doesn't learn her lesson after that, it may be time for professional help...as in counseling, before she starts shoplifting and you hear it from the police...Also, you sis should be careful not to put the money anywhere where the niece can find it...Tell her to put it up on a shelf or something where the niece can't reach it...

Answer 7

Mine are all under 11, once they know what stealing is, the punishment is spanking. If your niece was my daughter, she would be grounded as well as spanked, because she told a lie too. Lying is another "core rule" we have, If they break a core rule, it's a spanking. Better have your sister put a stop to it now, before it gets worse. In order to stop a certain behavior, you must make them think before they do it. For me, as a child, and for my children, the thought of a healthy bare bottom spanking, always stopped me in my tracks.

Good Luck

Answer 8

It depends where you live, if it is a small town, talk to the police and ask them to come and do a fake arrest. Take her to jail and make her stay the night. The next day come and make believe to bail her out. Let her stew for a couple of days about having to go to court. Then tell her they dropped the charges and that she does not have to go to court.
I am not sure something like that can be done in a city, but talk to the police chief and ask.

Answer 9

Have her return everything (that you can) that she bought with the stolen money, then if you could not return it, make a list of out of the norm jobs to do, like cleaning the toliet, scrubbing out the trash cans. Then explain to her that her Mom's purse is not a public item, it is not to be touched. I had to do this with my 12yo and I live in a small town so I called the police and scared her into never doing again

Answer 10

One thing you could possibly try and this sounds cruel, but I know someone it worked for, is: take her to the Police Station and have them explain to her that you can have her arrested and what that means. Sometimes they will fingerprint etc. to give her a taste of what could happen if this continues. I know someone who actually had them pretend that their child was under arrest and walked out and left them there. Of course, Mom was in the parking lot, but it was enough to scare the child that he never stole anything again. Hope this helps and good luck!