This is an almost common story, with an almost different ending.
It started on Monday, when a boy came in offering garbage bags on the tables of a restaurant in Las Cañitas, but looking for
something more
than just selling bags.
The trick is effective and requires some expertise.
The seller supports the product on the customer's cell phone that is on the table, covering it.
When he leaves, he picks up the bundle of bags with the cell phone underneath.
And it takes everything.
Martín, the owner of the premises -in Báez at 200- knew the maneuver.
As soon as the boy picked up his package, he asked the client if she had her cell phone.
She said no, he caught up with the boy on the sidewalk, pushed him to the ground and held him until the police arrived.
The client recovered the phone and the boy was arrested.
While waiting for the police, Martín learned that the teenager had the same name as him and that
he was 15 years old
.
"If you want, when they release you, here you have work
," he told her.
On Tuesday afternoon, the boy returned to the scene of the crime.
This time he was accompanied by his changarín father - he is good at electrical work in José C. Paz, where they all live - and his older brother, another 17-year-old boy who has a girlfriend who is expecting a baby.
The father apologized to Martín for what his son had done.
The boy also apologized - he spent a night in a Juvenile Institute and was released the next morning for being unimputable - and promised to return to school, which he left this year.
When he tried to steal her cell phone, he must have been in class.
Since he is a minor and there are legal obstacles for Martín to give him work, they all agreed that the job would be for Lucas, his older brother, who turns 18 next month.
They are waiting for him today with a "bachero" job.
Dishwasher, which is what was needed.
The story of Martín, a bag seller and occasional cell phone thief, was repeated
3,515 more times
in 2022 compared to the previous year, according to statistics released this Wednesday by the Buenos Aires Attorney General.
Although this time Martín was arrested in the Capital, in the Province there were 19% more crimes committed by minors under 18 years of age.
There are 22,018 crimes with adolescents detained.
Sixty a day.
One every 25 minutes.
The crimes of unknown perpetrators do not enter here, which are
the overwhelming majority.
Crimes committed by minors increased in 18 of the 20 judicial departments of the Province.
The exceptions were San Nicolás and Trenque Lauquen.
There were 47 percent more boys committing crimes in Morón, 32 percent more in Pergamino, 29 percent more in San Isidro, 30 percent more in La Plata (where the Buenos Aires Police headquarters are located), 20 percent more in La Matanza and 18 percent more in Avellaneda.
In San Martín -which counts the minors of José C. Paz, where the boy who went to rob Las Cañitas lives- crimes committed by adolescents increased 21 percent.
The fine print of those figures hides
a fright
.
In that same judicial department - where a year ago 24 people died with poisoned cocaine - minors committed
72 percent more murders.
The almost common story of Las Cañitas changes when the owner of the restaurant offers the way out of a decent job.
The almost different ending is when the thief returns to his family, apologizes, and takes the job for his brother, another teenage boy-to-be.
Happy ending would be that the boy with the bag trick returns to school for good, for another chance.
