Biting the Hand

TLC doesn't often have clients or volunteers stealing from us. Although there have been a few noteworthy exceptions.

I remember one time when I called the manager of our Las Vegas facility. It was on a Saturday morning and he hadn't reported any collections from the night before. So I called to ask him about it.

"Well," he said, "the reason I didn't call any collections in is because I have the collection bag sitting beside me in the bar where I'm having a beer. Plus I used some of the money to buy some crack and I'm about ready to go back and buy some more."

"Wait right there" I told him. "We're on our way." And after I hung up the phone I called my chief operating officer and told him we needed to make a quick flight to Las Vegas.. It was two more days before we found him. He didn't have any money left. But he did have our company pickup, which we took possession of.

Another time, a client stole one of our company vans and drove to California to visit Universal Studios. I think he also stole some of our money to to cover his expenses on the trip.

And the reason I bring this up is because we discovered, during an audit this week, that one of our volunteers had been stealing from us for about three years. Now not a lot of money was taken. But that isn't the point.

The point is that we run a recovery program. And one of the precepts of a recovery program is people learn to be honest and not steal or do other things that would cause them to want to relapse. When we first confronted this person about stealing from our business it was vigorously denied.  The person claimed that it must've been a "memory lapse," or that they "forgot" to make an entry or pay for the personal items that were on the receipt.

In each of these cases we dealt with the clients with a great deal of compassion. In a couple of the cases we discharged them.  Then let them back into the program later. In fact, today one of them has a position of great responsibility and handles a lot of money at times. He's turned out to be one of our most reliable volunteers. And we do this because we know that it takes addicts a while to get honest and to work a good program. And it might save their lives

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