Did I do the right thing?

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2 weeks ago i was walking into town and stopped to check my phone in a dark corner of my local high street. This random person who i did not recognize came up to me and said "you owe me 20 pounds". I froze for a second thinking he was joking but he just kept saying "i need 20 pounds" and he was starring me down a bit. I am a strong young man but i felt my safety was threatened and i wanted to avoid trouble so i handed 20 pounds over to him. I expected him to say he was joking and give the money back to me but to my horror he just walked of with the money.

I reported the incident to the police afterwards. The police lady who i spoke just made fun of me and was slightly laughing when i explained the incident to her and she said "why did you not just walk into the nearest food store". My family also said to me "you should have just run away from him since your one of the fittest people in town" (the guy who took the money of me was fat)


Overall do you think i did the right thing in this situation or not?



Thankfully i had more money on me so i had a good night out. lol the night before i had my jacket stolen in my local bar too.

I wouldn't ever give money to a stranger, especially not anything close to that amount, not unless that had a gun or knife or something pointed at me. I live around a lot of homeless people and junkies, after a while it becomes just second nature avoiding them. Don't make eye contact, don't stop, don't engage with them, don't listen to whatever spiel they have to say, just say a short pointed response like "no" /"sorry"/"I have nothing"/"I'm broke", and just keep walking. Most of these people do this stuff all day and are just playing the law of averages that a certain amount of people will give them money when they beg for it, they'll just move on to the next person to try to extract money from. Any body saying they need money for food is lying, anybody making some story up about needing gas money is lying, I would imagine the majority asking for change for the bus are lying too, most of these people just want money to get obliterated on drugs or alcohol altho some are just straight up professional scammers. I am more willing to give somebody change if they were just honest with me and said they just really need a beer or whatever than making up some ridiculous lie to try to guilt me.

I have sympathy for these people, the real worst off ones usually aren't the ones begging however. The aggressive ones are usually junkies or the professionals who just game the system.

You shouldn't have given him the money.

Cops don't understand Asperger's.

Next time, walk into a nearby food store.

Do you remember the South Park episode when their town gets overrun by homeless people all saying "Change? Change?"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlBtlDj-ARE

I have been told many times that if someone who tries to rob you poses a serious physical threat to you (with or without a weapon), you should just give them what they want because it's better to be robbed than to have the crap beat out of you or worse.

If you felt threatened by the guy and thought he was robbing you vs. just begging then it makes sense that you would give him the money.

Should not have given it to him.
Do not give money to random bullies on the street. They will continue to rob and threaten unless you refuse their threatening demands for money.

I don't think this is a "right or wrong" situation.

Were you taken advantage of by the guy asking for money? Most likely yes.

Next time, you don't have to be. You can try saying "no". Most people begging are going to just move on.

If you feel your safety might be threatened, throwing your entire wallet away from you (to cause the other person to go after it allowing you time to get away) would probably be the best thing. That is something you could report to the police. If you hand over money to the person, you could set yourself up for a dangerous situation if the person decides to grab your arm. You have to really judge the situation to see if you sense danger.

You voluntarily gave your money to this beggar. That is not something to report.

Just as a side note, due to some wonderful executive functioning troubles I was having a few weeks ago, I ended up in Boston without my wallet or any cash. I had to borrow money from the ONE person I knew that I would be seeing that night, and thankfully he had cash. Otherwise, I would have been the one walking around on the street telling my story that I needed 10 bucks. Thankfully that is *ALL* I needed, since I had a 2 hr drive home. Things would have been even worse if I was almost out of gas!! !

So, not EVERYONE who begs is lying.

Without actually having been there, how is everyone concluding that the OP gave money to a beggar and not to someone who was prepared to physically hurt him in order to rob him?

If you felt threatened you did the right thing. 20 pounds isn't worth your life. Reporting it to the police is the least you should do...and if you see him on the street dont approach him, just call police again, tell them you see the man that threatened you for money and let them handle it.

I probably would have given it to him too. He obviously needed it for some reason.