I stole only one single item so far in the game, and just because it was part of a mission.
After buying myself nice house in Whiterun I placed some items for storage in couple of chests. After some time when I got back to grab something I noticed that one item in every chest is suddenly red, as if taking it will steal it! It appears to be random, in one chest it's Bonemeal and in the other iron ingot.
I didn't steal them, from what I remember I picked the bonemeal from a skeleton and the ingot was placed somewhere and I took it – didn't steal it. (Crime stats prove this)
What can be the reason, or is this a bug?
Edit: The red items are always the same, and few months have passed (Skyrim time) already. It didn't happen in other storage I have (drawer in Jorrvaskr).
Actions I took to debug this:
- Took one of the two Iron Ingots in the chest, the remaining ingot became white and my Stolen Items count did not go up.
- Took one of the four Bone Meals in the other chest, still red. Took anothr and the remaining two were not red anymore. Stolen items count did not increase as well.
- I dropped the Iron Ingot to the ground. The command was
Stealand indeed, after taking it from ground my Stolen Items count increased by one though without any bounty even though it was right near a guard. Same with the Bone Meal.
Best Answer
You may have had a hireling steal or loot the item. This doesn't count toward your own items stolen, but the item will still be marked as stolen.
You may have looted an item which was already stolen when you found it. (I'm not certain how this can happen.)
You may have pickpocketed the item. This counts toward your "Items Pickpocketed" counter but not "Items Stolen".
Note: Picking up a stolen item in your own home won't increment your stolen items counter. I've tested this, but you may want to save first anyway. If the red in your inventory bothers you, bonemeal and ingots lose their Stolen status when crafted using Alchemy and Smithing respectively.