In recent weeks, there has been a small but notable increase in the arrest of students for thefts at Oak Park and River Forest High School.
It’s about time.
Exactly why this is seems unclear. Neither the village nor the school will acknowledge actual communication on the question of why it has been assumed for years that cellphones and fancy calculators were just ripe for the taking within the walls at 201 N. Scoville. Have your phone stolen in a park or a restaurant or while walking down the street and, of course, you’re calling the cops. That is not the history at the high school.
Perhaps the arrest in August of an OPRF student who had 200 electronic devices stashed in a Harrison Street apartment was a wake-up call to parents, students and OPRF that it is just as illegal to steal inside the high school as outside the high school.
No shame in having a problem with thefts at the high school. Plenty of shame in not aggressively dealing with it.
