Theft

“ Whether they are really honest is another question, and though no one would credit them with theft, would they be equally exemplary in regard to filthier and more nameless crimes? Why should a rich man steal? ”

“ But not the slightest clue to the perpetrators of the theft could be discovered.
“‘If it had been my own property that had been stolen I would not have minded so much,’ said Mr Flowers. ‘But trust deeds! it is too dreadful.’
“Various theories were promulgated as to the nature and motives of the thief, the most feasible one being that someone, hearing that a relative had made a will, had conceived that it was inimical to his interests, and had resolved to steal it from the solicitor with whom he believed it to have been deposited. ”

“ Violation of the property of others.—Theft.—In general, every kind of violation of property under one form or another, is called theft, and this action is condemned by morality. It is expressed by that ancient commandment: Thou shalt not steal.
The following are the various definitions of theft given by the jurists: “By theft is meant every illegal usurpation of the property of others.” [31] —“By theft is meant every fraudulent [Pg 86] carrying off for gain a thing belonging to others.” ”

“ A theft has been committed during the night; no one knows anything of it; the victims of it hasten to look for one of the robber's footprints, and on finding it, they cover it with something to keep the wind from disturbing it. ”

“ Winchester led you to the conclusion that the theft was committed by some one in the house?”
“Wait,” cried I, “you are going too fast; I do not say the theft was committed by some one in the house. I merely speak of an accomplice.”
“Who flung the diamonds out of the window—”
“Or merely gave the signal that they were accessible, and for the moment unguarded.” ”

“ It seems to us Englishmen that it would not be just to ordain two punishments for theft. The robber becomes the owner of what he has stolen; true, he got it by violence, but it is none the less his, for he can do what he likes with it. ”

“ I am aware, that you insist, that the kidnapping of a man, or getting possession of him, after he has been kidnapped, is not to be compared, if indeed it can be properly called theft at all, with the crime of stealing a thing. It occurs to me, that if a shrewd lawyer had you on trial for theft, he would say, that you were estopped from going into this distinction between a man and a thing, inasmuch as, by your own laws, the slave is expressly declared to be a chattel—is expressly elevated into a thing. ”

“ If theft is discovered on anyone's land and the thief is discovered, the lord of the estate and the thief's wife shall have half of his property and the claimants shall have their goods, if they find them. And with regard to the other half, if the theft is discovered in a district over which the lord has rights of jurisdiction, the wife shall lose her share and it shall pass to the lord.
"Further, we forbid the buying or selling of any livestock except within towns and before three trustworthy witnesses, likewise that of any second-hand goods without a surety and warrantor." ”

“ Among themselves, theft is fully recognized as a crime, and they have arrived at such a pitch of civilization that certain persons are appointed to act as magistrates, and to take cognizance of theft as well as of other crimes. If a man were detected in the act of stealing, he would be brought before the house of the king, and there speared to death. ”

“ This I had no objection to do, if only the writer would head his notes with the dicta, that the man who endeavours to screen a thief is as bad as the thief; and that if the property stolen has been entrusted to the safe keeping of the thief, and he, and those whose servant he is, are paid for protecting it, the theft is of an aggravated kind. ”

“ My thoughts gave a jerk and dwelt upon the money. I grew afraid; deadly afraid of myself. The theft rushed in upon me in all its details. I saw the little shop, the counter, my lean hands as I seized the money, and I pictured to myself the line of action the police would adopt when they would come to arrest me. Irons on my hands and feet; no, only on my hands; perhaps only on one hand. The dock, the clerk taking down the evidence, the scratch of his pen--perhaps he might take a new one for the occasion--his look, his threatening look. ”

“ The term theft, sometimes used as a synonym of larceny, is in reality a broader term, applying to all cases of depriving another of his property whether by removing or withholding it, and includes larceny, robbery, cheating, embezzlement, breach of trust, &c. ”

“ But I may as well know if your men have keys of the office?"
"Neither. I have patent locks to each door and I keep all the keys myself. If Worsfold or Ritter arrive before me in the morning, they have to wait to be let in; and I am always present myself when the rooms are cleaned. I have not neglected precautions, you see."
"No. I suppose the object of the theft—assuming it is a theft—is pretty plain: the thief would offer the drawings for sale to some foreign Government?" ”

“ Thus, for the definition of an act of theft, the right which the act has violated must be distinctly marked, and also the mode in which the violation has been committed. In one and the same class of offences, those against property for example, the mode in which the violation is performed is that chiefly which constitutes the difference between one offence and another. In a theft and a robbery, the right violated may be exactly the same ”

“ But as soon as we limit our consideration to the more serious forms of theft, such as burglary and similar crimes, we shall discover that they are committed almost exclusively by individuals whose principal or subsidiary occupation is theft, and who, in general, do not consider it shameful, and do not feel the slightest repentance. ”

“ When a theft has been committed, a royal herald is sent through the town, who at once announces the fact, and declares the king’s intention to punish the offender; the threat, more often than not, has the effect of inducing the culprit to lay the stolen goods under cover of night in some public place, whence they may be restored to their owner. ”

“ For instance, during a scarcity or a hard winter, not all of those who experience privation have recourse to theft, but some prefer to endure want, however undeserved, without ceasing to be honest, whilst others are at the utmost driven to beg their food; and amongst those who yield to the suggestion of crime, some stop short at simple theft, whilst others go as far as robbery with violence. ”

“ As a general rule, in order to find the author of a crime or a theft, it is necessary to determine how that crime or theft was committed, or, at least, how it could have been committed. In the present case, nothing is more simple, because we are face to face, not with several theories, but with one positive fact, that is to say: the thief could only enter by the chamber door or the window of the cabinet. Now, a person cannot open a bolted door from the outside. ”

“ If children of subordinate rulers or chiefs are robbed, the thief shall be fined ten pieces of calico.
Sec. 2. (a) Theft of small articles (petit larceny) such as articles of diet, etc., of the value of one piece or half of a kusta or sarong, shall not be punished by fines, but the articles themselves shall be restored to the proper owner or owners, twofold, and the thief shall suffer fifty lashes; if the theft is repeated on two or three occasions, the offense shall then be regarded as a case of great theft. ”

“ The police must know about it at once; a theft is a theft, whoever is involved. If respectable people choose to turn themselves into receivers and disposers of stolen goods, well, they’ve ceased to be respectable, that’s all. ”

“ Add to these the great bulk of juvenile offenders convicted of theft, and that peculiar class of people who steal, not because they are in distress, but merely from a thievish disposition, and it will he manifest that half the cases of theft in England and Wales are not due to the pressure of absolute want. ”

“ In one word, under whatever form it may be concealed, misappropriation of another’s goods is always a theft. In popular opinion it often seems, as if theft really takes place only when the criminal takes violent possession of another’s property. ”

“ A theft has been committed, Mr. Rutland. My daughter has stolen something very valuable from me--a package of private papers, so important--well, if she succeeds in making them public I shall be injured to such an extent financially that there won't be any more generously splendid donations for you or anybody else. I have done my best to persuade her to return what she has stolen. Now you try. Bring her to a realization of the madness of what she is doing. ”

“ These savages consider a successful piece of theft as a laudable act, and estimate it according to the skill displayed in the accomplishment; like the Spartans, who considered that the dishonour lay not in the act of robbery, but in the discovery of it. ”

“ Why couldn't you do what he asked?"
"Because the will was gone when I went to take it out. There was nothing to show Mr. Delahunt but the empty shelf."
"Oh, a theft! just a common theft! Someone overheard the talk you had with your brother. But how about the key? You had that?" ”

“ They bring a man hither whom they have taken by the hand, and they say: 'He has taken something, he has committed theft.' (When he denies, they say) 'Heat the hatchet for him.' If he committed the theft, then he grasps the heated hatchet, he is burnt, and he is killed. But if he did not commit the theft, then he grasps the heated hatchet, he is not burnt, and he is delivered. ”

“ Three-fourths of all assize indictments and many quarter-sessions indictments were for various types of theft, including petty larceny, grand larceny, housebreaking, burglary, sheep stealing, and robbery. These offenses were mostly opportunistic rather than planned, except for London's underworld of professional thieves and the cutpurses of country markets and highway robbers on lonely roads. There were substantial peaks in theft in periods of harvest failure and industrial depression, especially by vagrants. But most of the poor never stole. ”

“ Whoever induced a man of this class to dispose of his master’s property by stealth, more particularly when the tempter became the beneficiary of the theft, was compelled to suffer imprisonment for a month and to restore four times the value of the articles which had been carried off. ”

“ I saw even the man who was placing the gorgeous trimmings on the Nuncio's coach carefully searched, lest he should have concealed about his person a scrap of the valuable material. That they are thieves is not to be wondered at when their catechism teaches them "that a theft that does not exceed a certain amount is not a grave offense." ”

“ I was wrong. I knew I was wrong, and yet I persisted. If that is possible of any explanation it is this: From the day I left my father my lines had been cast, or I cast them myself, among crooked people. I had not spent one hour in the company of an honest person. I had lived in an atmosphere of larceny, theft, crime. I thought in terms of theft. Houses were built to be burglarized, citizens were to be robbed, police to be avoided and hated, stool pigeons to be chastised, and thieves to be cultivated and protected. That was my code; the code of my companions. ”

“ For were it once to prevail so far as to make property insecure, industry would lose heart, enterprise and frugality be crushed, and at last the honest turn thieves in self-defense. Nearly every act of theft had a baneful influence on the person robbed. ”

“ Has A ever stolen anything? it is enough to record one judgment against him, or to bring one witness on the matter in order to establish that A committed theft at least once in his life. If, however, it is to be proved that the man has never committed a theft, his whole life must be reviewed point by point, and it must be shown that at no instant of it did he commit larceny. ”

“ For a thief, whether he steal much or little, let there be one law, and one punishment for all alike: in the first place, let him pay double the amount of the theft if he be convicted, and if he have so much over and above the allotment―if he have not, he shall be bound until he pay the penalty, or persuade him who has obtained the sentence against him to forgive him. But if a person be convicted of a theft against the state, then if he can persuade the city, or if he will pay back twice the amount of the theft, he shall be set free from his bonds. ”

“ But though there may not be the smallest doubt in the world that our money was our lawful property, the law seldom recovers it for us, even when it punishes the robber. This is usually the case even in the more vulgar branches of theft, such as burglary and pocket-picking, but when it comes to the more complicated devices of the swindler, our chances are poor indeed. ”

“ Gentlemen of Jury, simple as this case seems, it is a most important one under the present condition of discontent which afflicts this country, and of which we have had such grievous manifestations in this Court to-day. This is not a common theft, gentlemen—if indeed a theft has been committed—it is a revolutionary theft, based on the claim on the part of those who happen unfortunately to be starving, to help themselves at the expense of their more fortunate, and probably—I may say certainly—more meritorious countrymen. ”

“ One man, for instance, confessed to having stolen gold from a local gold-mining company, and produced the wedge of gold which he had stolen, and asked them to treat him as he deserved. The manager of the company luckily was a European, who wisely refused to punish a man who had so spontaneously confessed his theft. ”

“ Dealing with stolen goods by persons other than the thief may affect the rights of such persons either criminally or civilly. Two varieties of crime arise from such dealings. (1) Receiving stolen goods knowing them to have been stolen, a misdemeanour at common law, is by the Larceny Act a felony punishable by penal servitude for fourteen years where the theft amounts to felony, a misdemeanour punishable by penal servitude for seven years where the theft is a misdemeanour, as in obtaining goods by false pretences. ”