Off Topic Break In [Archive] - Rotary Wing Forum

Screw

11-19-2003, 02:20 PM

Today @ 0419 hours our house alarm goes off.  Running downstairs to check everything, all seemed well and the alarm panel indicated the back windows.  As I'm checking the back windows from the inside the alarm co. calls and I had no explanation for the alarm they called the police. While waiting for the Police I go to the back yard to check the windows from the outside.  There is a swing in front of 3 of the 6 back windows and a bar pertuding from the swing alittle.  I didn't see any of the screens cut and the police showed up fairly quickly.  After the police did a walk around they figured the wind pushed the swing into the window and set off the alarm. My wife and I kinda thought that was odd because there was no wind but figured it possible.  Reset alarms and went back to bed.   0547 hours the alarm goes off again.  Running downstairs again I could see nothing and the alarm co. called and I advised them that I think something isn't right with the contacts and asked the to advise their service dept.  This time I was way tired, being up with the baby a few times and the alarm twice, I didn't reset the alam and went back to bed. Later my wife and I were talking about and noticed the bar in the swing that was petruding a little further than the first time we noticed it.  My wife said maybe someone tried to use the bar to pry open a window. After looking at the bar, and relooking at the outside windows again, We could see where someone had tried to pry open all six windows and it looked like they tried with that bar. We recalled the police to refile the report only to find out that no report was filed to begin with.  They came back out and we showed them all that I had mentioned.  Even noticed one of my daughters chairs was placed close to the fence on the inside.  Since it rain all last night and this morning there were no foot prints. One police Officer decided to check the front Windows and there was no damage out front but someone did a number on one of the side windows as well.

Screw

11-19-2003, 02:24 PM

The scary parts: 1.  Our house is alarmed and someone tried to break in not once, but twice. 2.  After the second alarm I never reset. 3.  Ain't got a clue as to how long this has been going on. Best guess: 1.  It's someone I know.  Which means I have something they want 2.  It's someone I don't know trying to get Christmas shopping early.  T.V. whatever. If someone is trying to break in while we are home, they: 1.  Want to hurt us. 2.  Feel more secure with the cover of night.

Screw

11-19-2003, 02:26 PM

I will be up all night watching our house from a distance.  I want to catch the S.O.B. and I pray it's no one I know.

GyroRon

11-19-2003, 02:45 PM

Okay John are you sitting? I know this sounds like a BAD idea but remember this.... My father had worked with ADT since I was 12 and I personally have sold installed and been around security systems for quite a while. First off, it is in most cases true that the common crook will avoid a house that shows signs of a security system. I mean if they are just looking to smash a window and grab the TV set why take a chance with the house with the ADT sign out front when the guy two doors up has nothing? But sometimes crooks are just that much dumber and they will try your place anyway. Now if you have a attacker coming to harm you or the family then you need to lock all the doors and windows, install and use security lights, and IMHO go out and get a handgun or shotgun and be trained to get it and use it quickly if the alarm goes off. BUT..... if it is the common crook or pervert, what we have found - NOT ADT but my father and I - is if you leave the alarm on and set, but leave the doors and windows UNLOCKED! your better off. You see nearly all break ins start with a attempt to go through a open or unlocked door or window. Rather than have this guy screwing up your house - I have a 1000$ deductable and don't want to pay a grand to fix a busted door - you " ALLOW" him to gain entry to the house without breaking or harming anything. But if you do this.... The important thing to do is to arm your system with no delay on the siren and a minimal delay on the call to the monitoring station. As a matter of fact if you can be good about it I would use remote key fobs to arm and disarm and go to NO delay. this way as soon as the crook opens the door the siren goes off and the monitoring station gets things cooking. 99 percent of criminals will run for their life at this point and never be back. Anyway that is what we do and we have done it for years with no problems. And the bright side is you dont have to fiddle with keys when you come home and want to go inside with a handful of stuff. Just twist the knob! - just don't forget to diarm the alarm when you pull up.

Screw

11-19-2003, 02:59 PM

Considering the crooks set off the alarm and came back again in less than 2 hours means to me this person want in. I used to be a Training Drill Instructor for the Ga. Department of Corrections. *I trained Officers in Use of Force, Firearms, Fisrt Aid, CPR and all general instruction courses set out by the GDC to include Basic Correction Training. * I am armed and pissed.

GyroRon

11-19-2003, 03:02 PM

The alarm scared them away.

donshoebridge

11-19-2003, 09:04 PM

John, As Ted Nugent would say, Wack'm and Stack'm!  The individual in question is most likely a terrorist!  You know what to do! Don

Screw

11-19-2003, 09:10 PM

Well, It's 0706 hours and I stayed up and outside in the shadows all night. *Armed with 1911A1, flashlight, cell phone preset to 911, an escape route out of the yard, and car keys in my pocket..... Not a Thing!  It was so quite you could hear a mouse fart in the woods.

DougKspokane

11-20-2003, 12:26 AM

Just a thought: IF this is someone you know AND he knows that you surf this forum THEN he may know what your plans are BECAUSE they are here for him to read. That can do one of two things: 1. Make him decide that this is NOT going to work. 2. Give him information that he can use. I love the internet but I really don't like putting too much out there. I hope you catch him.

donshoebridge

11-20-2003, 02:11 AM

John, I see you are a fan of the .45 ACP.  Good choice!  It may only hold 7 rounds, but with that size of round, one is all you need. You need one of my Ghillie suits so you can hide better.   ;D

Screw

11-20-2003, 04:22 AM

Using my superior level of investigative techniques, I have determined that there were at least two people in my yard.  There approach was from the north east and climbed over my wooden fence. Good thing about rain is it leaves mud wherever feet were.  I also have two sets of sneaker prints where the attemted could be felons crossed. Where I camped out last night, I could have seen them comming, had breakfast, way before they got to that section of fence.  I would have been on them like a middle age man on a college girl. I happen to know for a fact that it was no one from this forum.  Although most of us will do alot for gyros and parts, none would stoop that low. Yes, I love 1911's.  Got a pretty mean weak hand only reload too.

Hognose

11-21-2003, 12:33 PM

John -- In about 90% + of burglaries, the objective is portable/saleable stuff such as jewelry and consumer electronics, and the burglar is a drugs user. I dunno how urban/rural your environment is, but if it's rural, the drug is probably methamphetamine. Point is, being on this stuff does not do anything positive for the doper's judgment and ability to perceive & anticipate probable consequences. By the time a drugs user needs to commit a burglary, the effect of his last dosage has worn off, and his craving for a new dosage has addled him further. This _may_ explain the repeated attempts at an alarmed house. However -- returning to the place he set off an alarm within hours is not normal doper/burglar behaviour. It is more indicative of someone who is after something, or someone, inside. In Britain the burglars routinely hit occupied houses, in the States it's rare, for many reasons (you could say 1911 reasons...) cheers -=K=-

Brent_Brown

11-22-2003, 10:48 PM

John you should not be outside. shooting them outside is a good way to go to jall. wait inside in fear for your life. That way you can put that knife in his hand and no one will know but you. Never shoot them in the back. The law is on the bad guy side. 20 pound test line with trouble hooks placed at eye level works best to let you know they are in the house. Brent

donshoebridge

11-23-2003, 02:53 AM

Brent, It all depends on which state you live in.  Take Oregon (Orygun) for example.  Back in the late 80's early 90's, Oregon was fairly loose about matters such as this.  It may have changed over the past 10+ years however. Case in point.  A girl friend is at the boy friends house taking a shower in the afternoon.  She hears someone beeting on the front door, attempting to break in.  She get's out of the shower, goes down the hallway wrapped only in a towel, and just as she enters the living room where this person is at, he breaches the front door.  Now it's a foot chase!  She runs back down the hallway to the beddoom, closes and locks the door, and retrives the boyfriends handgun.  Just then the bedroom door fails and the bad guy is confronted by a scared, wet and naked young women who is armed.  Doing the right thing, the bad guy turns and begins a hasty exit of the house, with the girl in pursuit.  The bad guy exits the front of the house and the girl fires at least 2 rounds at the guy, after he as already exited the house!  It is possible that he as already crossed the property line, I can't remember for sure.  The man drops dead 100+ yards from the front door. The police respond and take her in for questioning.  After a 2-3 hour stay down town, she is released and given back the handgun, case closed! This is only one of a handfull of events that I've heard on TV during the time I lived in the Portland area.  Michigan on the other hand is completly opposite.  Even if you're in own house, you have to be nearly dead before you shoot anyone in self-defense in Michigan!  I'm not totaly sure what would happen in Indiana.  They are fairly loose with there CCW permits here - background check, $25, and 6 weeks later, you got it!  No pictures, no training, no legal classes, nothing! Don

Screw

11-23-2003, 03:58 AM

Didn't mean to start a debate here. I waited outside because I felt like that was my best vantage point for observation.  I would have had a choice to engage or not. I could have called the police way prior to them doing anything to set off an alarm.   I also wanted to know if it was someone I knew.  Had it been someone I knew, I probably would have confronted them after calling the police. Firearms for me, are purely defensive tools available to me should the need arise.  I am not a cowboy and I am very familiar with the laws of the state of Georgia with regards to the use of deadly force. john-

donshoebridge

11-23-2003, 11:13 AM

John, I didn't meen to come across like I was trying to debate anything.  I understand exactly where Brent was/is comming from.  I've heard of those nightmares as well.  I was just trying to point out that each state has a different level of tolerence toward crime.  Not every state is like California, where you had better help carry the loot to your own car so the bad guy doesn't sue you.  Sorry left coasters.   ;D My father had a problem with someone stealing stuff from his shed several years ago.  He knew who it was because of the tracks in the snow.  The police on the other hand stated that they could not do anything about it unless someone actually saw this person do the crime.  So dad, took a 110 instamatic camera and "rigged" it up to the door of the shed so that he could photograph this looser.  After the police had shown up at the house the first time, this guy never came back.  But my dad did get some nice pictures of himself because he would forget about the camera. So how about some $12 fake video cameras mounted to the outside of the house? Don

Screw

11-23-2003, 11:55 AM

I had been thinking about some serious flood lighting, razor wire, clay moore mines, flares, pungi sticks, about 30 inbreed chijauwas (can't spell), an xwife, and real cameras. john-

donshoebridge

11-23-2003, 08:56 PM

I had a friend of mine in Oregon who owned an indoor flea market in a bad part of town.  They were always having people break in.  They installed an alarm and were armed most of the time. The building they were in had skylights and a couple of times they were broke into through them.  The roof of this building being flat and had a 3' parapet wall.  To keep people from breaking in through the skylights, they glued razor blades and broken glass around the top of the wall.  They also took several 4x8 sheets of plywood and drove 3" long nails through them and laid them pointy-side-up at the base of the wall.  Anyone dumb enough to continue their climb over the wall, past the glass and razor blades, would end up nailed to the roof when they jumped over the wall.  And yes, they did get one guy that way.  After this person was removed from the roof by the fire dept., they never had anymore break-ins through the skylights. Don

Udi

11-24-2003, 01:18 AM

One night I wake up at 2:00am and there is some noise coming from my back yard. *I look out the window and I see a few guys hauling stuff from my shed to their pickup. I call 911 and tell the officer I have burglars in my back yard emptying my shed. *The officer tells me there are no units in my area and they will send one to take a look as soon as they can. I go back to the window, and I can see that these guys are almost done emptying my shed. *So I call 911 again and tell the officer not to worry, I just shot the three burglars, and I hang up the phone. Within 2 minutes five police cars and a SWAT team are surrounding my house. *The officers sprint to the back yard and arrest the overwhelmed burglars. The captain comes into the house to talk with me. *"I thought you said you shot the burglars" he tells me. So I tell him "and I thought you said you have no units in my area"... *::) Udi- *8) p.s. This story did not happen to me personally!

Screw

11-24-2003, 01:33 AM

I will definately remember that one Udi :D

pleok08

11-24-2003, 06:13 AM

Reflection: On one of my many 'extra' jobs; I used to work in a Phillips 66 gas station here in Albuquerque.  As I was in the process of being robbed burglarized on the graveyard shift, I dialed 911 and spoke to the operator in a clear voice while all the thievery  was occurring.   I was informed by the male operator that because I saw no weapon (I stated in response to the 911 operator's question, that no weapon was being pointed at me), that gas stations had next to no priority, and that there was no police officers in my vicinity. As both of the young robbers / burglars were leaving, I dialed the Dunkin Donuts 1 block up to street, asked in a very calm voice to speak to any police officer present, and then exclaimed in a very loud voice that there appeared to be a crashed Harley Davidson motorcycle at my gas station, but I was unsure if the motorcycle was a police motorcycyle or not. I had three police cars at my gas station within 5 minutes.  To make a long story short, I was 'threatened' by the police officers present for 'orally' filing a false report. I quit that day when my management informed me that I was being 'written up' for involving the police in what the videos showed was a 'non-violent' robbery. I no longer take extra jobs working by myself in either gas stations or convenience stores on the graveyard shift.

Aussie_Paul

11-24-2003, 05:46 PM

Oh boy!!!!!!!!!!! I just love that one Udi. Aussie Paul.

quadrirotor

11-24-2003, 11:00 PM

;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;D ;D ;D ;D :-* :-* :-*

Screw

11-29-2003, 11:40 PM

That SOB tried again. This time we were out of town, and the alarm co. called us around 0530 the day after Thanksgiving.  We got in last last night and the house was still secure, however, the intruder managed to damage our windows some more. We had the police come back out and file another report in the event the insurance co. needs it.   I have a guy coming to the house today to install some serious flood lighting.  My yard and house will look like a baseball field when he is done. I was thinking of hiring a PI to watch the house for while and get some pictures, but I have no idea what that would cost. What ya think?

Phil_Ruffin

11-30-2003, 02:26 AM

I think you should invest in some of those motion sensitive cameras like deer hunters use. They will take pictures in the dark, I seen some photos from this type of thing and they look really good. Maybe set up some kind of trigger so when the flood lights come on and the camera starts rolling.

CLS447

11-30-2003, 06:54 AM

Phil great idea, but John Check out the Radio Shack catalog first. They got some really cool night cameras with moniters & recorders. You're gonna get some great ideas there!! I was gonna get one but they stopped breaking windows so far. Then three weeks ago I backed over my small female Minpin dog. Broke her pelvis in 3 places.  Its been rough for us especially the $2000 vet bill!! It could have been $5000 if they would have done surgery but they didn't. She is doing very well & starting to walk on all 4 again. Goes to the toilet on demand & all. We are very thankful because we love our dogs very much.

PW_Plack

12-05-2003, 02:49 PM

John,

Back over the summer, I bought a $25 piece of webcam software called VisionGS, from a German college student. It uses any of the cheapo digital cameras, (a $39 Fry's Electronics special in my case,) and can be set up to grab a picture anytime there's motion in the field of view. It can then either upload the file to a website using FTP, or e-mail it to the address of your choice. That way, if they steal your computer, a copy of the picture survives.

I'll try and set it back up next week and post a link to show you how it works.

Screw

12-05-2003, 07:26 PM

Thanks.

I had my experiance at the house profiled by a PI I know.

The profile suggest neighborhood kids. Very unorganized attempts, and really not wanting to get in the house bad enough to cause any real damage (Break a bay window.) Chances are they don't even know me and are doing it to see what's in my house and steal what they want.

Flood lights will be installed tomarrow, and my PI friend has people watching my house with night video. Trying to get them in the act and follow them home for the police.

john-

Mike Hook

12-12-2003, 06:22 PM

LOL all ya need is what I have------------
biggggggggggggg ole dog

Phil_Ruffin

12-18-2003, 11:41 AM

Big Ol Dogs work, but I have a cat that would work also.

CLS447

12-20-2003, 04:29 AM

Hanging over my TV...

CLS447

12-20-2003, 04:31 AM

Hey Thumper, here's my pinball!