I was recently the victim of a violent crime. Well, violent isn’t the best choice of word, so I’ll settle for vicious. My FlashCard was violated. Yes, that’s right, it was taken from my possession and roughly $200 of my food plan was used to buy junk food by some sort of hardened criminal.

Now, for those of you who are reading this and don’t know me personally, there is one thing that you must know: I love food. Eating is one of my favorite pastimes. So, if you mess with my food plan, you mess with me. I was outraged. I was appalled. I was absolutely sick to my stomach.

I needed to take immediate action. Step one: Report missing FlashCard online. Step two: Get new FlashCard. Step three: Talk to the very helpful ladies in the FlashCard office. And finally, step four: File a police report.

As if I wasn’t already upset enough, things were about to get a whole lot worse. One of my goals in college has been to avoid coming in contact with the police and, up till now, I was successful. I had stayed on the right side of the law. As I walked into the Kent State police station I was convinced that I was the victim. Turns out, the police officer I was about to meet had other ideas.

I only needed to go into the building and file a police report. I was just mild-mannered college student Jen Steer who just wants to be able to eat for the last few weeks of the semester. And the officer was a middle-aged man who thought filling out a police report for a stolen FlashCard was a total waste of his time.

I have seen my fair share of “Law and Order”-esque shows, so I think I have a decent concept of how interrogations work. Therefore, when he started to ask me questions, I knew that I was the one under investigation. Without actually saying it, he was accusing me of spending the money from my food plan. Every time he said the word “stolen,” he might as well have gestured using quotation fingers. I tried showing him the printout of the transactions, but regardless of what I did or said, he continued to make fun of me.

The officer picked up the lanyard that was the former home of my FlashCard. He asked if I wore it around my neck all the time, saying, “That’s why they make these things.” As if I didn’t know that. I just wanted to yell at him, “So you want me to wear my card around my neck 24 hours a day, seven days a week? A lanyard does not go well with a skirt suit!”

It’s been a few weeks since the incident, and I’m told that I could get some of my money back. So remember: Keep an eye on your FlashCard at all times so that you won’t find yourself at the police station, trying to convince an officer that it really was stolen. And if you are the person who stole my FlashCard, I will fight you. Well, maybe.

Jen Steer is a sophomore broadcast news major and columnist for the Daily Kent Stater. Contact her at [email protected].