Victim of crime?

Matthew Huish
June 13, 2010

The car I share with Farhad was broken into a couple of nights ago. Somebody smashed the front passenger door window and ripped out the radio/stereo. When I discovered the car in this state, the prevailing emotion was annoyance rather than anything else -- I was annoyed that I'd have to sweep up the glass and get the window replaced.

Thank you Admiral for car insurance. I had to pay only the £70 excess and the window was already repaired on the evening of the same day.

In fact, I felt grateful that my car was broken into and not anyone else's -- it was as if my car was offered as the scapegoat on behalf of all the other cars on the street.

I'm not really bothered by the loss of the radio because it was a very simple machine and I wanted to replace it anyway with something that could play CDs or connect to an MP3 player. In a sense, this crime was a blessing in disguise.

I actually feel sorry for the person who did this to my car. I'm trying to imagine what their life is like… it must be very sad. This person stole a radio that's practically worth nothing, when some expensive child car seats were left untouched -- obviously this criminal was rather foolish.

In fact, I'd go as far to say that the person who broke into my car WAS the victim of crime, not me. They are a victim because this action will only perpetuate the problems in their life, whereas it was only a couple of hours inconvenience in mine.