Justice

For someone like me who doesn't trust the government or authority in general, I must say that I've had a situation where the system has worked and I have benefited from it's services! Last July my house was broken into and I had my PS3, 65 DVD's, digital camera and a suitcase stolen. I reported it to the police then Jena suggested using the spreadsheet I keep of my movies to create a list of the stolen ones and turn them in to nearby buy back places like Half Price Books. I did this then next day and just a day after that I got calls from both places saying someone had come in and tried to sell almost all the movies on my list! They asked for driver's license and this dodo gave it to them, with one place telling me the name and address of the guy and he lived right around the corner from me! I turned all this info into the police and about a month later they questioned this guy while he was in custody for parole violation of something else he'd done. He said that a friend of his did the break in and brought the stuff to him to sell, then sold the PS3 to another person and he gave them names of the robber the one who bought the PS3. They picked this clown up and he had 3 prior convictions for theft and had gone on probation for all three. I had renter's insurance and filed a claim. I lost $2200 in total and after the $1000 deductible, got $1200 from Traveler's, using it to buy back everything but having to put the rest on credit cards. Well a couple of weeks ago I got a call from the Travis County DA's office saying they'd taken this guy to court and eventually he got probation AGAIN, BUT he had to pay restitution and I got a call today saying I would be getting the other $1000 in payment in about a month! Granted, Jena and I's detective work really helped, but the system took him before a judge and worked with this asshole's defense lawyer to figure things out. Getting this money back will take me back to a point where it's like it never even happened and that's very good indeed.