Prank or a real crime?

From Yahoo News this morning:

So far in 2008, Baby Jesus has appeared in several police reports.

At First United Methodist Church in Kittanning, Pa., a baby Jesus was stolen and replaced with a pumpkin. In Eureka Springs, Ark., someone who absconded with a plastic baby Jesus from a public display last week also took the concrete block and chain that was supposed to act as a deterrent.

Previously, stolen Jesus figurines have also been defaced with profanity or Satanic symbols.
The incidents raise a question: Is stealing Baby Jesus harmless juvenile fun, or anti-Christian?
"I suspect most of it is childish pranks," said attorney Mike Johnson of the Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian legal group. "Clearly, there are adults with an agenda to remove Christ from Christmas. But they tend to occupy themselves with the courts and courtroom of public opinion."

Stephen Nissenbaum, a retired history professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and author of "The Battle for Christmas," views the thefts as neither innocent vandalism nor religious hate crimes.

"What it means is that it's OK to go around violating even pretty important norms, as long as real human harm isn't being done," he said. "It could be Christian kids doing it — and on Jan. 2 they become good Christians again."
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This is part of an article about how churches are using GPS devices implanted in their baby Jesus figurines, and other parts of large outdoor nativities, in order to track down the criminals/pranksters who take them year after year. Here's an idea--just chain all the figurines together. And/or permanently fix Baby Jesus into his manger in some way. Ideas for that include Super Glue, 4" galvanized deck screws, lag bolts.

Or just attach an anvil to each figurine; you can order them from ACME. That's what Wile E. Coyote, Genius, would do.

The waste is just incredible

Detroit Police to burn 572 guns

BY TAMMY STABLES BATTAGLIA
December 5, 2008

In another shot at crime, the Detroit Police Department is burning 572 guns today, part of the more than 4,520 firearms confiscated from the hands of criminals during 2008.

Officers expect to display the guns for the media in the Detroit Police Department's Precinct 1 garage downtown at 8 a.m., then take the weapons to an undisclosed location to burn them.
The burn will be the last one of the year. The remaining weapons will be used as evidence to prosecute those who might have used them.

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Good grief. The least they could do is reuse the metal to build a homeless shelter... or recycle it into steel beams to build a house for Habitat.

Or, here's an idea suggested by another reader via comments on this story: sell each gun to a registered user (a non-criminal) for $500 and make over $2 million for the city! That would help the schools, the libraries... hell, it would pay for 25% of what Kwame spent on shutting up the policemen he fired. I just hope the next mayor of Detroit is not as embrassingly loose with taxpayer money and can at least clean up the mess. Anything more than that would be a true miracle.