Police arrest man, then give him bike

[Liberal_in_LA]

Police arrest man, then give him bike

(CNN) -- Police officers in central Taiwan arrested a man for stealing a bicycle this week and originally planned to lock him up for theft charges.

However, the police later discovered that the man was so poor that they not only did not prosecute him but instead decided to donate a bike to him.

According to police officers in central Taiwan's Chiayi County, the man stole the bicycle from a high school near his home in order to help save his daughter time in walking from her vocational school to the hospital.

His daughter usually walked 10 kilometers (6 miles) to take care of him in the hospital. The man has often been ill and has had to be hospitalized, police said.

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Police officers learned that the man was living in desperate conditions, with no access to water or electricity and was living in an empty shipping container beside a graveyard.

Chiayi police officers not only did not press charges against the old man but jointly bought a new bike for the girl.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/09/11/taiwan.poor.bike.thief/index.html?hpt=T2

[5X]

1. You can tell this isn't middle america.

Especially, not tea baggers.

[Taitertots]

4. If it was America than he couldn't afford to be in the hospital

[Orrex]

2. I hope that they had the decency to taser him first

I mean, standards must be maintained after all.

[Joe Chi Minh]

5. ROFL! I was just going to remark on their lamentable standards

in the undeveloped world beyond your shores....

[pinto]

3. Great vignette. Sounds like the man and his family have enough on their plate, as is.

Kudos to the police for this simple act of compassion.

[Lyric]

6. You mean there are still places in this world where the police

are allowed to occasionally temper justice with mercy? That it doesn't ALWAYS have to be a bludgeoning hammer, and can instead be an instrument of human compassion?

I admit it. That shocks me. What can I say? I'm a citizen of the United Police States of America. God knows *I* have never witnessed such a thing.