Let Off with a Caution

Fourteen-year old Jane was lucky this time, Caught by a store detective with a bottle of hair conditioner, eye-lash dye, and a copy of Hello magazine hidden in her bag, she found herself in a van being driven to the police station, Even more upset than Jane was her Mum. She was as white as a sheet when she went to collect Jane from police station, and burst into tears.

Jane says, "I was lucky. Two policemen came and looked at my home, which is very middle class and respectable. I think that's why they let me off. They even asked to see my school books."

After two years of regular shop­lifting, Jane has decided to go

straight from now on. She says she did it mostly out of boredom, and not to impress her friends as a lot of youngsters do. But she feels she's grown out of it after the fright she got the other day, and has decided to look for other interests.

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Just English. Английский для Еористов

Y ellow Fever

Roy Philips Downfall was the colour fellow. Appearing in court on shop­lifting charges, he wore a yellow parka, yellow shirt, yellow pants, and a yellow tie. It was a similar dress that drew him to the attention of the store detective at a

supermarket in Oldham, England, where everything he was after had a yellow connection: lemons, jellies, mustard, cheese, three pairs of socks, and two pairs of underpants. He was given a one-month suspended sentence.

Shop-Lifting Celebrity

Anna Bronx, the well-known. TV Mrs, Bronx was far many years a

personality, was found dead in her well-loved personality on a popular

flat in Knightsbridge. this morning programme, but for the last several

after taking an overdose of sleeping years had withdrawn tram public

life and was living by herself.

. Friends say that they did not think

The tragedy occurred less than a she was unhappy, but that she may

month after she had appeared in have been a little bored after such,

court on a charge of shop-lifting in an active public life,

a department store. It was claimed _{д was of cgurs& a} ^^ ^^

that she had taken goods worth _{she wa;g arreste}/_{for shop}_i_lftin^

£7.30 when she was arrested outside _{Local feeli wag that} ■ _th«

the store. She was sentenced to a _{magistrate had been far too sever6|}

fine of £100, and was given a two- _{a feeijng that can on{y glw}

week suspended sentence. _{this tmgic incident-}

TASK 10. Retell each story from Task 9 as if you were a Store Detective or Police Officer giving evidence in court. Use some of the Colour Idioms given below:

о to catch smb. red-handed — to catch smb. during his or her committing a crime

• to be in the red — to be broke, having no money « to see red — to get terribly angry

• to appear out of the blue — from nowhere, unexpectedly

• in the black and white — in a very clear way

C hapter III. La^v Enforcement 87