To the editor:

Sometime around 60 years ago, I stole a bracelet from a classmate. I was in the third grade. Upon receiving no information to her questions, the teacher, Miss Hanna, said she would search desks until she found the bracelet. Of course, she found it in my desk but she continued on until all the desks had been searched. During our talk, I was never allowed to think that what I did was OK or acceptable. On the other hand, I was not made to feel that my sin was unforgivable.

I was not publicly humiliated. I was not sent to the principal’s office. I was not hauled off to the principal’s office kicking and crying.

The police did not haul me away in handcuffs. No suspension. No front page story the following day. Thank God for Miss Hanna, an adult, who handled a problem that came up on her time in an appropriate way.

I am worried about a little boy forced by law to return to a classroom where he was made to feel like a criminal over a piece of candy.

By comparison, I would have been hauled away in cuffs and charged as an adult for felony theft and battery.

Ruth Jarvis,

Lawrence