After two years of prosecution, a security guard has been acquitted of taking a cookie worth less than a dollar from the office fridge

Anyone who works in an office will know about the petty politics around food. Whether it’s items stolen from the communal fridge, stinky food reheated in the microwave, or just the disgusting sounds of someone slurping and chomping their way through their lunch in the cubicle next door.

But this story from South Korea really takes the biscuit. Literally. In 2024, a 41-year-old security guard known only as Mr. A was patrolling the building at 4 am and took a single Choco Pie snack (value $0.72) from an office fridge. This was apparently a routine workplace practice, with delivery drivers working early shifts telling security guards to take an occasional snack “as a gesture of goodwill”.