Face to face with someone who stole from me

[hanban89]

I own a menswear hire shop. We also hire boys outfits.
During the summer my staff member done a hire for a woman with two boys (her sons) and the outfits never are back. Think expensive. In the region of £800. I tracked her through facebook and discovered she had given me the wrong name (she used her maiden name I think) her ex FIL address and a fake number. I reported it to the police who have been great and took it very seriously, collected evidence, went to see her etc. The policeman ended up getting pissed off as she started not answering the door to him, and kept hanging up on him. She was already known to police btw so he knew where she actually lived and how to contact her. It's now going to court.
Anyway I went to bingo with my mum the other night (I know I know) and there she was sat on the next table. I didn't know where to look or what to do. She bloody won £1000! I found this annoying to say the least.
My mum said I should go and speak to her and I said no just leave it with the courts to deal with. My mum thought AWBU. I wasn't was I? She's annoyed for me as I'm having to foot bill for the outfits as I needed to replace them.

Whatever you do don't speak to her as that might be looked on as hassling her and lead to the case being thrown out. Leave it to the court. You will have your say there and it will not be a very nice experience for her.

No way! Leave it to the official route however tempting it might be to jab her in the face with her bingo pen!

Karma will bite her on the ass one day.

Leave it to the police. They have taken it on, let them get on with it. Nothing you can do will make it any better.

Its terrible that if you confront someone who has stolen from you. You could be charged with harassment, but. That's the way the world is, so. On that basis leave it to the police. They seem to know what they're doing.
Its not as if. The suit was ruined by accident and she was scared of telling you or that she couldn't afford to replace it. By giving you the wrong details. There's no doubt she had no intent on returning the suit. The horrible bitch. You work hard to set up your business, well your livelyhood and you come across scum like that. As pp said karma will have her.

You did the right thing, it would only have been used against you had you confronted her.
I hope the police are able to charge her soon.

I hope this thief gets her come uppance in court.

I'd let the police(?) your solicitor(?) know that she won the money, so she can't plead lack of funds if she's made to pay for the suits. Chances are she'll have spent the money by the time it gets to court, but it'll show that she had the money to make restitution at some point but chose not too (not that I'd expect a thief/conwoman like her to do the right thing at any point anyway).

Of course you did the right thing. It's not like an honest mistake that can be solved with a simple conversation, if you approached her you'd have just got into a screaming match and it would count against you in court.

Not really the point here....... but if you're renting out outfits then surely you would take a holding deposit with a credit card at the time of hire, to avoid situations like this?

Sorry but I had to ask!

Leave it for the police to deal with. Not sure I could follow my own advice though, cheeky bloody cow.

The courts will sort it out, but do let the police/the prosecution know that you witnessed her winning £1000 - that will help in case she pleads poverty and us allowed to pay you back at £1 a month.

But yyy to what 19lottie82 said - when I hired a suit from MossBross I had a hold put on my credit card for the full value of the suit and had to sign a form saying that I agreed to pay the full value if I failed to return it or damaged it.