Q&A: An Employee Who Steals
An Employee Who Steals
Question
Hello Rabbi,
I installed cameras and discovered that one of my employees is stealing from me.
By my estimate, it’s a matter of less than a thousand shekels per month (technically it’s hard to steal very much).
He’s a successful employee. I don’t want to fire him. And I also don’t want to confront him about it.
I do want to deduct the estimated amount from his salary. There are ways to do this quietly.
A lawyer told me that legally I’m not allowed to. That concerns me less.
Is it permitted from the standpoint of Jewish law?
It would be a bit strange if, in order to protect my interests (recovering what was stolen), Jewish law would force me to lose more (to confront the employee and naturally end up parting ways with him). It comes out that I lose in every option.
Thank you very much.
Answer
Even if you take it back from him, he’ll keep stealing from you afterward. So I don’t see how you can avoid a confrontation. That doesn’t mean you have to fire him. You can come to an understanding that this will stop, and that’s that.
A person may take the law into his own hands only if he can prove his claim in a religious court. If that is the case for you, then perhaps it is permitted. This is different from a situation where you are preventing the theft itself; there you can certainly do so even without the ability to prove it.
Discussion on Answer
I think so. But you must be careful not to deduct from him more than what you know with certainty that he took (and not everything that is missing, because maybe that is for some other reason).
It’s a matter of dignity. It’s hard for me to believe he’ll keep working if he knows that I know he stole.
Each month I’ll estimate the thefts and deduct roughly that amount from him. Unless the problem gets worse, in which case I’ll have to confront him. I need him for the next six months, and after that it will be easier for me to fire him.
There is not the slightest doubt that the man is stealing from me. It’s filmed unequivocally.
There is, however, some doubt that maybe he has some other justification that I’m not thinking of, whatever that might be.
If that’s the situation, is that considered that I can prove my claim in a religious court?