I have had a similar situration to chainer's. My mom had a guy house/dog sit for her while she was in the hospital getting hip replacement surgury. When she came home, she walked thought the apartment with him to check and see if anything was out of place. He left and then she started noticing things going ary. Apperantly, before my mom was released form the hospital, he had taken a few dish towels, soaps, did not clean the pots which had cooked in but instead put them back in the drawers, ordered Pay-Perview, downloaded a new version of AOL onto my mom's computer and was looking at porn sites, and finally picked the lock on my mom's filing cabinet and took a bunch of cash form her. In doing so he also had access to all of her finacial documents and jewlery which apperently are all still there. My mom found out about it and called the cops (After 14hours! I'm so pissed at her about waiting so long!) and the cops said they could not dust for fingerprints, nor could they arrest him on charges, that she would have to take this to civil court. This doesn't sound right to me, and i was wondering if anyone else could advise me on this matter?
Hmmm... This is a two-fold answer here, one that may confuse and frustrate you.
It
IS a civil matter, but then again it isn't.
Your mom entered into a verbal "civil agreement" when she allowed the male into her house, giving him implied full access to the house by entering an agreement that stipulated he would basically "occupy" the residence (i.e.-"House-sit/Dog-Sit") during the time she was in the hospital. As far as the porn sites, the updated version of AOL, the uncleaned pots:
That's ALL a wash. No real damage has taken place, besides possible virus corruption, and your mom feeling a little violated, but there is no real "fiscal" value that can be placed on looking at porn sites.
The dish towels and soap dishes are a
civil matter, and
not a
criminal matter. Imagine if you let your friend into your house to spend the night. You wake up the next morning and he ate some of your cereal and took your morning paper. It is not a burglary because he had full access to your residence, is a known occupant, and was allowed access. I don't know if I am explaining this right, but it is simply not criminal.
Regarding the loss of the towels and soap dishes, assuming that your mother purchased each soap dish and towels for $5 USD each, and this guy took say...5 of each, you're looking at about
$50 USD in a total loss. To even file a civil lawsuit, you're looking at upwards of
$200 in court fees to get the ball rolling, and it's a case your mother may or may not win. You'd have to have receipts showing proof of purchase, your mother would have to be able to articulate where each of the towels and soap dishes were, colors, models, etc.
The only thing I can see as criminal is the theft of cash from a locked drawer. A locked container expresses implied privacy, and there is an expectation of privacy when an individual places property into a locked container. That said, your mom is going to have to be able to know exactly how much and which amounts were in the locked drawer. It is going to be very hard to prove that he took your mother's cash from the locked drawer because I am assuming she does not have the serial numbers on the cash bills? Also, the male could say that somebody else took it while he was gone due to the fact that he was only house-sitting, and not at the residence 24/7.
Lastly, the fingerprinting. It isn't like CSI, and it never will be, unless you have the Federal Homicide case of the year where the Government is going to spend $500,000 on evidence collection. Your local agency is not going to dust your mom's house for prints because:
A.) The house in and of itself is considered a "high traffic" area, and will yield way too many prints to sift through,
B.) The male was given access to the house, therefore his fingerprints being present on any piece of furniture is justifiable,
C.) Due to the fact that your mother did not report the incident right away, the "crime scene" is seen as contaminated.
Your mother's best bet is to draw up papers to serve to this guy with her signature and a date, demanding payment for the items she believes he's taken. If he says no, then she can follow-up with the civil courts. As far as the cash theft, she needs to know amounts and how many of each bill, and make a Police Report documenting the theft. The Police may ask the male if he took it, but if he says no, there is currently no corpus to go out and arrest him based solely on your mom's statements, even with a private person's arrest.
Sorry about our mother's situation, this definitely sucks. Hopefully, I was able to answer a couple questions, and I apologize for the novel. Maybe
Q_the_Cop can chime in, he's in the Dick Bureau and may have some more insight than I do regarding civil situations like this...