Out of the many similar examples I've been privy to, I've called the police on my neighbor when I heard him screaming at his 9 year old daughter and threw her down the stairs. Cops showed up three hours later, had a five minute conversation outside the guy's house, didn't even ask to see the girl, and left. The next day, every window in my house was broken.
.. and you left it at that??
seriously. That's when I go back to the baseball bat approach.
I did not leave it at that, the result was months upon months of drama that doesn't really have any bearing here so I omitted it.
There are three problems with involving the police. The first, as I mentioned, is lack of insurance. The second, which I also mentioned, is the tendency of the local police to only involve themselves in ways that make the situation worse and/or make the victim suffer a little more. The third, and most compelling reason, is that I am not supposed to be staying at the place I am staying while I find my new home, and while my friend is okay with me staying there, his landlord, who lives next door, is not. If his landlord discovers I am staying, he has already said he will hike the rent beyond what my friend can afford to pay.
Sadly, police involvement isn't going to help me here. I'll just have to slowly rebuild my collection of awesome things back up from scratch again.
Also, don't think I mentioned it, but whoever robbed me also (I think) added sugar or something to the gas tank, and I could not get my van started following the robbery. However, on a mechanic friend's recommendation, I added Octane to the tank, and after running really rough for a few minutes, the van evened out and started running smoothly again. This means I don't have to start taking the bus to school, which is, needless to say, a nice silver lining!