My Victim Check

This week's mail brought a check for $11.49 from Travis County Community Supervision & Correction's Victim Services unit as the first of the restitution payments for our burglary. (22 rifle, fax machine & the cost of replacing 4 locks.) The perp (Miss H.) was supposed to have started making payments last February or March, and I'm assuming there is a bit of a gap between the time she makes the payment & the time the county cuts the check.

I'd been meaning to call and tell them that we'd found the rifle at the ranch, but I couldn't find my letter from them that had the case number. The check had the case number (well, most of it) and the phone number for victims services (which I'd also lost), so I was able to call them today to get this straightened out, since we really don't want Miss H. to have to pay for something she didn't take.

When I called, it took them a bit of time to find everything, since the check didn't have the last 4 numbers of the case, I've got a fairly common name, and the perp had a common name, and, as the victim's services advocate said, "She's got a lot of cases!" We knew that she'd been involved in at least 6 burglaries that happened about the time they hit our house.

Well, we do hope Miss H. gets her life back on track, and perhaps it will be a bit easier for her, since now she has slightly less to pay off. We are grateful to her for cooperating with the police, and helping the victims get most of their belongings back.

NOTE: The Miss H. who burgled us is not the Miss H. on my MySpace friend's page. That Miss H. is the Austin High School art teacher who got fired because a friend had posted nude photos of her on the internet.