Have you had anything stolen?Did you get it back?

My mum got burgled when she was 98 (she is almost 100 now). She lives in supposedly secure sheltered housing (block of 37 flats). They had installed a new entry system whereby the front door to the centre was operated by fob keys. The door took a long time to close after opening with the fob key. Some scumbag opportunist sneaked in when the door was still open ran down the first floor corridor trying doors. Unfortunately the door to my mum’s flat was open and he stole her purse which was on the sofa and took her jewellery box. There wasn’t a lot of money in the purse (which was found later in a back street and returned to my mum as her name and address was in it) but all her precious and sentimental jewellery had gone. The police blamed the door and said that there should be CCTV installed but despite me actively pursuing this it is yet to happen.

My mum was starting to shown signs of dementia and was in the flat at the time. As she is quite deaf her TV was loud and she never saw or heard the intruder. If she had, it could have been a lot worse. He also ran upstairs and stole a handbag from the lady upstairs whose door was also unlocked.

My mum lost everything that meant so much to her (her mother’s wedding ring etc.) I think with her dementia it didn’t really sink in. I was just so relieved that she didn’t disturb the thief as it could have been a lot worse if he had pushed her out of the way as she is so frail. Only the lowest of the low could do such a thing to elderly and vulnerable people.

Had a break in a few years ago while l was in bed.He took quite a few things but luckily the police managed to get most things back as they had a suspect. .since had an alarm fitted which has given me peace of mind.

My Brother was on holiday (1980's) and came home to a break in? But it seemed no entry or damage to get in...His next door neighbour ,(and they were friends?!) had come through loft and down into his house. Took quite a lot of items, but then it seemed, stood at top of stairs and threw items and children's toys, down the stairs!!?? It took quite some time to solve.....
My home was also burgled, lots taken ,someone knocked on my door with my (empty) purse, it only had a coupon in with my address, it had been found two roads away from my home in a wooded area., about 4 years later.....
As everyone states, its the personal items that matter, and it does hurt so much....

yes ....As I turned my back, my handbag went from my trolly in Tesco I had only popped in for a lettuce...that was within mins of going in, sadly I had just been to the bank and had cash in there with my bank book...advice is to get back home as soon as possible if house keys are in your bag...we quickly went home and cancelled cards ets but it still cost us over £1000 by the time keys for car, locks for house, etc etc had been replaced... many many years before this a purse was stolen from my bag I still don't know how...and another time many more years before when I was 15 l hung my bag up in the hairdressers with my coat and the £1 note I had saved for my hair had been taken so I had no money to pay with!!! its so sad people do this to others.

We were burgled and had laptops, cash etc stolen. Luckily I had installed Prey on my Mac laptop and as soon as it got switched on, I got the exact address of the person opening it. Sadly this was not the burglar who had sold it on but a young lad who had bought it cheap. The burglar got Scot free but the young lad got charged with handling stolen goods.....not exactly fair!

During a burglary some years ago, my purse was stolen, among other things.
Dh’s briefcase was taken, but he found it, and a lot of important papers, thrown away in a quiet lane behind our garden.

However the biggest surprise was getting my purse back about 6 months later! Someone in a road not far away had found it in their garden, and since my driving licence with my address was still in it (and I hadn’t got around to replacing it ?) they kindly put it through the letterbox with a note.

Long before Smartphones I had a little Nokia which a dd used a lot more than I did. One weekend she was off to a barbecue on the other side of London, and the phone was nicked while she was in a supermarket buying sausages for the barbie.

She hadn’t even missed the phone until the friend she was standing next to had a call, asking whether she knew who this number belonged to.
‘Yes, she’s right here.’
‘We’ve got her phone.’
It was the Old Bill - who’d just nicked someone for shoplifting and found the phone in his haul.
The next day, bless them, they returned the phone to me on the other side of London. ?? Old Bill.

Burgled twice - first time lost all inherited jewellery (and all my best undies (as I was pregnanat at the time) which they must have tipped out of 2nd drawer down to cover haul in - also stolen - sports bag). All the police officer could say was "well we've never had any burglaries around here before" - almost implying we were in on it - very upsetting!
2nd time was after weekend away, and culprit (drug addict) caught, but nothing recovered - not even our car (stolen from drive, in the 10 minutes it took for police to go and get some warm clothing to stake out our property as key for our 2nd car had been taken and they were convinced they'd be back for it!) Nothing ever recovered. I still look at websites to see if any of my mum's jewellery (very distinctive as made to her spec in Singapore) is ever advertised for sale. I did buy a pair of earrings on Etsy which I think were mine, but the matching necklace and ring have never appeared. So sad!
Insurance great for the broken/damaged windows/doors etc but money can never replace the pleasure and pride of wearing your inherited jewellery when the mood takes you.

I had a tree in a pot taken from my garden. I gave my husband a birthday present of a pair of underwear printed with red hearts on it and it went from the washing line. In Cyprus we hired a car and I discovered a rather expensive camera underneath the passenger seat. I gave it to the man at the car hire company and he said he would find out who had left it there and contact him. But I wonder if he did.

Afterthought - I stole a thing. I was about 7. I can see it now - green tortoise shell effect propelling pencil. Mum noticed it. I had to take it back to school and confess.

handbag from top of cycle basket, 2 mins from my home, he took about £3 cash as I had just used cash for shopping, was caught after using one card in 2 places, bank replaced that cash also phone which had texts from when my father died. nothing was found though

I think I’ve been lucky as I have only ever had a purse stolen from my workplace in 1966, no bank cards then just a small amount of money. When he was in the sixth form our older son had a lovely Dawes bike which he had spent a lot of money on and it was stolen from outside of Safeway on the day he started his first part time job; he was devastated.

Thankfully I have never had a break-in, but I did have a brooch stolen from my jacket that I left on a theatre seat (prominent London theatre) during the interval. When we came back for the second half the lady who had been sitting behind me didn’t come back.
The brooch was gold with small sapphires and diamonds, probably not worth the cost of the theatre seat, but it had sentimental value. What a blessing I didn’t leave my handbag!

Well, do you mean that egg slicer thing I used to have?.. Or the lovely grey suede handbag I couldn't afford (snatched while I tried shoes on). Or the bike I used to get to school? Or the Christmas wreath from our front door one New Year's Eve. Or the friendship lost through her husband's sneaky groping. Seems dishonesty is endemic. I live in a remote and 'crime free' area... On the one hand, I know it is the small change of life. On the other it really is not nice to have to distrust everyone.

Years ago, not long after we got married, I planted some fuchsias from the local nursery to brighten up the communal area of the block of flats we were living in. We had a lovely group of neighbours, they came out to admire them and somebody brought out wine and we stood around chatting and drinking it. Next morning, somebody had nicked all the plants out of the ground. I was so upset that some passerby had just thought they were entitled to take our stuff.
Then we were in Disney Paris, and me and my daughter, then 13, were up tower, waving down at DH and my brother, when I actually saw a hand snaking into the bag over my shoulder, yelled loudly and saw the thief vanishing down the steps. A very solicitous French bloke fussed, asking what was wrong and got in the way as I tried to give chase, or alert our men (DB was a detective sergeant), only realised afterwards that the bloke was probably in cahoots. It turned out thief had been RETURNING my purse to my bag. Cash had gone but cards left. At the time, France used PIN numbers but we didn’t. I was lucky. Had gone to get more cash from hole in wall as we entered the park, but it was empty, or he would have had £200 more. Still, it spoilt the afternoon, we had to leave the park and go to a police station a couple of miles away to report it for the insurance and were there ages with very disinterested gendarmes, wished I hadn’t bothered. Very unsettling and ruined the day

Yes a hifi system. It was very expensive in the seventies. We were going abroad for three years so my husband asked our best man to look after it until we returned home. When we returned the guy wouldn't take our calls and we eventually gave up.

The chap downstairs from our 1st floor flat had learning disabilities. We came home to find the landing loft hatch open and the ceiling kicked in. Lots taken electric razor, radio jewellery boxed china, and a table cloth still in the packet. We had just got married so was mostly wedding gifts. Police came, then next day the chap downstairs said to us it was his friend and he was leaving with him. I rang police and they came immediately lights and sirens on. Stopped the van and arrested both of them.
We got almost everything back and the new table cloth which I had hidden wedding present money in and resealed was still there intact.

We had a car stolen from a car park in Oxford, when my daughter was at uni there. It was my DH pride and joy....we’d only had it a few weeks! It had all the fancy locking devices and was in a car park with a security barrier. When went to the place station to report it they were only interested in what type of radio it had and said that the car would probably be on its way to Europe...stolen to order! Needless to say, we didn’t get it back, but the insurance company paid up the full value within a couple of weeks!!

When I was newly married, I too had my knickers stolen from the line. There were about eight pairs all lined up and looking pretty. I actually saw a man jump over my fence and start nicking them. I called out to my husband and he and a neighbour ran after the thief and caught him.

We often used to tell the story of the "Knicker nicker."

Some years ago I was staying in a hotel in babbacombe and had my handbag stolen sometime during the night. Did not miss it till the next morning. They took the money and my phone. My handbag was found at the bottom of the cliff lift. I was left peniless on a coach holiday. Luckily the driver lent me some money as I said I wasnt going to go out on trips. It was not a very good end to the holiday as I was reluctant to spend anything as I kept thinking how am I going to pay it back. They left a mini laptop which was charging next to my handbag. Apparently at the time a lot of other people had things stolen from the same hotel jewellery. The police came to the hotel but all I got from them was a crime reference number. I heard it was an inside job later but have no way of knowing. I remember speaking to reception to ask if anyone had handed it in and got told no to go to my room and ring my phone. I said I had no money to pay for the calls but got told that didnt matter. I did not know at that point that other people from different coaches had had things stolen.

We got back from a break with MIL to find front door broken, TV gone, Fridge gone (contents tipped on the floor) kettle jamming the freezer opened so contents ruined. Jewellery gone, handles broken off wardrobes, bedspread missing.
Police were useless, strode though the broken door saying "if you'd had locks on the windows this wouldn't have happened!!" to which I replied "The windows have locks, but they weren't any use when they broke the windows!!

We were burgled the night after we went on holiday. We'd found the taxi driver up the side of the house whilst we were getting ready but couldn't prove it was him giving leads. The person looking after the house came home and started tidying up because he thought we'd left it in a state! It was only when he noticed the DVD player gone, he realised. He called my sister who came down and took the cat back with her just in case the burglars called again. The cat escaped so we lost her along with a lot of jewellery and all my valuables. That's when I found out that my mother who I was living with had let the insurance lapse.
We recently had a burglar enter the house whilst we were up and take my electric bike. Fortunately it had a tracker on and the police recovered it.

We lost all our money, tickets, cards, which were locked in a safe on a cruise ship. Very long story, security called, cabin and safe searched etc. Later that evening they were all returned, back to the safe, although we'd changed the pin code. The captain, a small fat foreign gentleman, said we were both liars. This was a ship popular with British passengers, sailing usually from Tilbury. I'm happy to say they are no longer trading. Never trust safes on cruise ships.

Yes when we moved to a new property several years ago we had 3 hanging baskets stolen overnight and a lovely German shepherd statue from front of our house, no never got them back, we should have secured the hanging baskets better than we did and as for statue we should have cemented it down, it was so heavy goodness knows how they took it. Lesson learnt though, all hanging baskets are now secured, and our garden ornaments safely secure

Our car, it was in the garage for a service and when DH went to pick it up it wasn’t where they had parked it (with the key left in the ignition !) DH said the desperation on their faces as they were running around the site looking for it was priceless! They’d had a celebratory and his entourage visit that day so were obviously more preoccupied with him. DH said you can run around all you like it’s not here so what are you going to do about it?! Never saw that car again and no one was ever arrested.

I have twice been the victim of pickpockets.

Both times I got my empty wallet back because someone who said they had found it in a waste bin returned it to me!