I feel like he wouldn’t find it objectionable if someone compared to Neal to Kate, because he’s good people, not a “thug”.
True enough. Kate is not exactly a pirate now is she? While Neal was a common thief, he wasn’t exactly a thug. Too bad we never saw how Neal managed to turn his life around so that he could afford an apartment in Manhattan. We can only presume that after he fled the law to Canada he got a new identity. However, he was still going by the name of Neal when Emma found him again, so it’s not entirely clear. If he returned to the United States under the name of Neal Cassidy, he’d probably have been picked up by the police and done his time for stealing he watches.
"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy