Truth of the Money

The Year is 2005 and Matt Smith sits in the back of the auditorium listening to the principal threaten the senior class for “Crimes committed against God and our school”. “There will be no Senior Prom” sputters the bright red faced Principle Clark. “The police have been called in and you will all be questioned”. Mark leans over to Matt and says “I think he has lost it this time”. Matt responds, “Please tell me you didn't do it?” Mark replies “We do a lot of things around here, but stealing $3,000 from the church?! No way”. Detective Eric Van Gundy stared at the four students that afternoon and said, “Your principle tells me you are the most likely candidates for stealing the money, you are all in trouble virtually every day”. Matt Smith looked at his friends and thought how are we going to get out of this? Mark Lattieri, a junior, is always in trouble for doing dumb things and pulling even dumber pranks. Ryan Hersey just has a big mouth and is always talking back to teachers. Matt King is the worst of the group, always trying to be the life of the party, regardless of who got hurt in the process. Yet they were all bright boys and individually they were pretty nice. After the initial police meeting, each of the boys had been interviewed separately. A few hours later they were sitting in the cafeteria and Matt said “Ok, we have to come up with a plan to solve this. It is evident from all of our recent police experiences we are number one of the list. So if they stop with us, the real criminal will get away”. “Great, so what do we do? Asked Ryan. “First we talk to everybody and visit all of the hot spots, especially food places and see if any students are dropping more money than usual. We will meet at Marks house after our search”. “And remember besides extra spending we are only interested in alibis between 3 and 5 last Friday afternoon. That is when the police told us the crime occurred”.

“Ok, what did you guys come up with?' Smith asked when they all got to Mark's house. Matt King said “ I talked to most of the kids in our class (Coleman Senior class is 34 students) and most have alibi's, only Rich Sophia, Cody Vincent and JC didn't have alibi's and the Stokes twins had half an alibi, apparently Michelle was with Mr. Clark between 3 and 4, and Danielle was with coach between 4 and 5 Ryan piped up that Rich Sophia told him that he saw JC and one of the Stokes twins outside the office around 4:15 and that Mr. Jones from the sandwich shop said Cody bought lunch and seemed to have a lot of money on him. Mark talked to JC and was told that Cody was near the office around 4 as well as one of the Stokes twins, and everyone knows the Stokes twins were the best students in the school and as straight as they come! “Well we have to watch closely over the next few days for a sign from one of our main suspects” King said. “Can we agree that Cody, Rich, and JC are our three suspects?” All agreed, but Matt Smith wasn't sure, there was something in their conversation that made in uneasy. A week went by with no new evidence and the prom was growing closer and the tension in the school was growing. No one was spending a lot of money, no extravagant or arrogant behavior and the eyes of the police and the administration was clearly on the four boys. Sitting at the lunch room Matt Smith couldn't get the case out of his mind. There is something that doesn't fit. Michelle Stokes came sat down and said hello, just as her sister Danielle came in the room. Mr. Clark said “Hi to Danielle and complimented her on her outfit”. “You and Michelle always dress so nicely”. Matt listened to the conversation when all of a sudden he started to smile. He turned to Michelle and said “why did you and Danielle steal the money?” Everybody went silent and stared at Matt. He went on, “I knew something was wrong, now I get it”, “ You and Danielle always dress differently so you can have your own identities, yet the day of the theft you wore identical outfits. Every witness said they saw one of the Stokes twins at or near the office, yet didn't identify you by first name. Each of the Stokes had an alibi for one half of the time period when the money was stolen. “IT HAD TO BE BOTH OF YOU!!!!!” Both Stokes twins broke down crying and ran out of the room. That was the day everybody started calling Matt Smith Sherlock!