'commit a theft' is a grammatically correct and usable phrase in written English.
You can use it when you say that someone has illegally taken something that does not belong to them. For example, "The police suspect that the burglar intended to commit a theft when they broke into the house."
The idea of O'Neill committing a theft is just impossible.
Investigators were looking into the possibility that the driver was fleeing after committing a theft at a CVS pharmacy nearby.
Fully 18% of whites aged 10 to 25 admitted to a violent crime, and 15% said they had committed a theft.
After subjects were shown a video intended to induce a happy or a sad mood, Dr. Forgas had them view deceptive or truthful interviews with people who denied committing a theft.
"I think there has been a culture that has been embedded in that environment that is almost conducive to committing a theft," he said on Tuesday in a telephone interview from Santa Fe.
Some of the employees, who submit written statements after being questioned by store security officers, have no idea that they admitted committing a theft or that the information will remain in databases, according to interviews with consumer lawyers, regulators and employees.
To see why, consider Kant's example of a man who commits a theft (5:95ff).. Kant holds that in order for this man's action to be morally wrong, it must have been within his control in the sense that it was within his power at the time not to have committed the theft.
Then I saw one of them out and about and followed them until they committed a theft.
You have committed a theft and sidestepped your way out of a five pence charge that, by law, you have to pay.
Half of the participants were guilty and half were innocent of committing a mock theft of $20 from a purse.
The store manager told a deputy he believed the suspect was the same person who had committed a similar theft in Porter Ranch on March 30.
