15 year old son stole my car and took it for a joy ride while were away

My sons got adhd (he’s 9) and this is a big worry of mine.

i did go on a course about adhd and they did warn about this that children with asd or adhd have a much higher chance of ending up in prison, taking drugs and hanging around with the wrong crowd.

this is why there’s consequences to his behaviour everytime, he’s not allowed to to use his adhd as an excuse for poor behaviour, destroying things etc.

you don’t mention anything about consequences for this, I’m not talking about taking an iPad off him, I’m talking about proper consequences like working outside or within the home to pay for the damage etc.

your son planned this, it wasn’t a spur of the moment thing, he saw an opportunity was coming up and he planned this in advance. That’s not impulsive adhd, that’s knowing something is wrong, planning it anyway knowing his asd and adhd will be taken into account and he will get off lightly.

He could have killed someone. Or even hit/injured someone with invalid insurance. You should report to police and he should accept the consequences. Otherwise he will do it again.

My cousin did this and got caught as he was speeding. His parents got the ticket with his face on it. They got a huge fine and he was banned from learning to drive until 25.

He is a perfectly normal functioning member of society now. Just a total hooligan as a teenager.

He needs to pay for the exhaust

You haven’t failed.
I do think reporting to the police would be good, he is old enough to have known right from
wrong and he will see there are consequences from his actions, but due to his age those consequences shouldn’t result in something severe.
I don’t know how it works if you don’t press charges for theft (for example) then do they not get a criminal record? In my line of work when we hear police checks there are often lots of “no further action” incidents that we hear about but as they have not been convicted I don’t know whether they are on their record.

Having said that, this kind of thing is common teen behaviour so don’t panic that he hasn’t been raised well- he will most likely grow up to be law abiding and remorseful. Don’t forget teen brains revert back to toddler brains in some ways but they do mature by 25!

@Peoplearereallyweird how accessible were the keys? Reporting it could bring insurance issues and you being questioned on the supervision of your children while away. Also your safeguarding if the keys wasn't put away securely.
It's about not giving him the opportunity to do it again. My DD (ADHD) seemed to lack any conscience at that age. It's no surprise that the majority of the teenage prison population has ADHD. I don't think that involving the police, even unofficially would help.

@Peoplearereallyweird if anything it’ll be a youth caution. Down to the police station DNA and fingerprints taken. He’ll get to speak to the duty solicitor. SS will call and talk you through the interventions that could possibly get involved, ask me how I know… 🙄

I was proactive and actually contacted the services directly and they engaged either me and DS. Glad I did because by the time the Youth Justice team got involved it was about 5 months later we could already show he was engaging with help. He got a 1-1 mentor as part of the intervention and then a Youth Justice mentor for another 4 months.

He’s older now and wiser and whilst there’s always some drama round the corner life’s not half as bad as it was and the caution and its outcomes were on the whole positive.

Yes this is a good idea.
In my area all sixth form/college students also get to attend a workshop called Learn2live. Not sure if it's a national roadshow but it's about young people and driving. They sometimes take mock vehicles that have been replicated to show what happened when a young driver was doing something dangerous. They also have real families telling their stories, often very tragic, where their teenager didn't make it home because of their or a friends dangerous driving.

As you also point out even reading local news articles usually throws up a tragic case every few months. Maybe this would shock the OPs son. Our local paper just had a report about a group of teens leaving a pub and the driver in the car at the back took a bend at high speed (over 60mph), flipped the car and died. Was not wearing a seatbelt. There were no passengers (so no distractions), no drink involved and he wasn't on his phone so it was due to error in speed and not having a seat belt on, so cases like this could show the son that it isn't always about doing other things wrong.

You haven't failed at all.
He had learned the skills so to do, and if he has ADHD he will have very low impulse control and probably just thought I know even to have a try.
I wouldn't carry on with telling everyone and getting social services involved, he made a mistake, but thank goodness he wasn't dangerous, and likely is feeling lots of shame already.
Try to calm a little and have a conversation, if he's already in a separate school and has a reputation, I would walk very carefully to assure he knows he did wrong but you are supportive and love him, it could very well go the other way of everyone thinks I'm an idiot so I might as well carry on which would lead to extreme behaviours.
Wishing you all the best x

What if he’d knocked someone down and killed them? Or caused a crash and wiped out a family. Should allowances have been made then because he’s at a special school?

Society is a mess because there’s always an excuse for kids nowadays. That lad who killed those little girls in Southport had a string of diagnosed conditions, so should allowances have been made for what he did? Is it ok to go and harm or kill people if you’ve got ASD or are in a special school?

This has to stop. This constant excusing of antisocial behaviour.

How did he break the exhaust? It sounds like he was just driving.

All these people saying how does he know how to drive…. You know driving sims exist in arcades and even in homes? My dd has a full set up as her and her grandad are f1 obsessed. She’s got the gear stick, the steering wheel, the racing seat and a 48 inch monitor. She’s been able to “drive” since she her grandad taught her at about 11. And her transition to an actual car was pretty seamless, she’s doing her driving test on Monday and had only had 10 lessons to refine her technique. Automatic cars also exist and are very very straight forward to drive.

my sister took my automatic car out on a joy ride with her mates at 15 , I went absolutely ballistic. She got a bloody speeding ticket. Mum wouldn’t let me report it and took the points herself as I was livid. But my dsis turned out just fine. Went on to get 3 degrees and is perfectly responsible. It was one stupid reckless mistake as a teenager and im honestly I’m glad I didn’t report her and her mates.

Idk if you’re going to contact the police. Another avenue is the fire brigade, if you know anyone from there. There were 2 teen boys killed in an awful accident last Friday night. They were in a sports car going along the road, the 18 yo driving, his 16 yo brother a passenger. They hit a bend too fast, careered through a wooded area, onto a bridge above the M1, then went over the side and fell on top of a mini bus.

The car was unrecognisable and the boys died instantly. Their poor parents having to make an identification. In this case, 2 of their children are dead.

I know a fireman. Most scenes the fire brigade go to are teen boy / young men losing control because they’re driving too fast. And on reading this back to myself, I’m thinking you probably should inform the police. Cruel to be kind.

This is a tricky one. Does the school have a police link officer? Some schools have someone that comes into school (generally focus is on drugs) and maybe you could see what their advice is.

I think the issue is while you have reviewed the footage there are some aspects you are not sure about. Such as whether he was speeding in one zone. What would you do if you did get sent a speeding ticket? Would you then admit to him being the driver?
As others have said, as you know he has commited an offence would this put you in the wrong? While he has his ASD diagnosis and could be used to claim he didn't know how wrong it was, you and your husband could be held to account for knowing about his joyride.

Read this after posting my comment. I agree. I think this is a really good point you've made that you do actually know a crime has been committed here and if some CCTV picks up he's driving (and he looks young) then you will be approached by the police anyway.

I cannot imagine any penalty would be too extreme and intervention work sounds like what is needed.

Part of me is tempted to suggest lying that it wasn't you that contacted the police but I wouldn't. Again it's bound to come out later anyway and while that might be a trust issue for him, it's also demonstrating that you hold up the law and laws are not optional, even for him.

So let's get this straight, he took your car, damaged your exhaust and doesn't see what he's done wrong?

You will not change the behaviour with a safe. And it's clear his behaviour had been poor up to this point.

I think this is really tricky because on one hand, he could have killed someone or himself. He's damaged the car so he obviously wasn't in full control.

Secondly, he doesn't seem to understand the severity of it. At 15 he should and if it's his ND issues which are preventing that, it doesn't stop him being a risk to himself or others.

Locking keys away only stops him doing that thing. What if he takes alcohol instead? Or takes a friend's parents car?

I don't know if there is a friendly teacher at school who you could approach because, and I mean this kindly, I think this behaviour is beyond only you dealing with it because I think it would be beyond any of us and I fear for his future. He needs some consequences of this for sure and being ND myself, I have concerns about it being used as a complete "get out".

Likewise though I have no idea what I'd do in this situation and despite my ND and extreme anxiety, at 15 I was taking long distance trains and commercial flights on my own, (responsibly) but mostly down to extremely bad parenting which meant I was having to parent myself at that age. Also my 15 year old I could not imagine doing anything like this for which I realise is more luck than anything I've done.

It must be so hard.

I agree with @BlueFlashingLights

Has he got the idea off the Ferris Bueller film?

Definitely tell school about what happened. Are there any particular teachers/TAs he has respect for that can talk to him? However if his behaviour is deteriorating it’s probably because he doesn’t like being there either. SEMH schools are necessarily the right fit for sad/adhd just because they are specialist provision.

Go back and talk to him when you are calmer and be aware his behaviour may escalate without his phone or gaming console. It’s often hard for them to articulate why they are unhappy but try and find out.

Have you had any support from anyone such as the Early Help team at the local authority for his behaviour? They might be able to signpost you to initiatives/interventions that might help.

Its a really shit situation for you to be in, and not everyone posting on AIBU has experience of life with an SEN teen so just ignore those who post in ignorance.

This is a really difficult position to be in. I'm sorry for you.

You haven't failed. He has made his own decision and he clearly knew it was wrong. How you respond to it is what's most important now.

I'm a police officer and I think you should report this. Two reasons -

You don't know if something happened where the Police are going to end up knocking on your door anyway - what would you say then? Feign ignorance? I think the truth (that you already knew) would likely come out and wouldn't look good.

It shows your son the consequences of his actions. At 15, the legal implications are likely to be different than at 17. His ASD will be taken into a account when making a final decision and he may well get some early intervention work that they wouldn't do with him when he's older.

For what it's worth, I'd be very annoyed if one of my friends asked me to have a chat with their kid about something like this so I'm glad you've decided not to do that.

@Peoplearereallyweird if you think there is a danger he might do this again you need to lock the keys away or take them with you.