A situation happened last night that I debated and as it is related to community, I thought'd I put it out there to see what my neighbors would have done.
Around 10:00 p.m. someone rang the doorbell. I had earlier been expecting someone, but not at that hour. The dog went ballistic (she hates the doorbell). By the time I got her back and opened the door, I didn't see anyone. My neighbor across the street was on her porch, said she heard a loud noise, came out and saw some kids ring my doorbell and run off.
Turning to look north on New Street, I saw the last one turn west onto Prospect.
I got the dog's leash and took her for a walk up Park Street (an alley). When we got to Whitefield Street, three kids met us walking south. They turned down the alley back toward my house. I waited few moments and turned around to go home. They stopped along the alley to smoke and one was talking on a cell phone.
At the house I let the dog loose to check the back yard, then went to my garage and found it locked. Needless to say since I'm posting this I'll be locking it regularly, but up until now I left it unlocked. I went to the garage for the purpose of locking it, but when I found it locked it occurred to me that the noise the neighbor probably heard was someone closing it fast and locking it as they did. We were watching tv and had an airconditioner running so it wouldn't have been too unusual that we didn't hear it.
There have been two incidents south of us on New Street that I am aware of where items have been stolen from garages (I know more reason for me to have locked it regularly) and this week a peeping tom was reported one block to the north.
So given all this, do you let it go as a prank - ringing the doorbell, or do you call the police in the event that someone, maybe not the same ones, tried to get into the garage and see what I had of interest to them?
I'd have let the ringing go, but with the garage being opened I decided to call. I figured at the very least if someone was checking to see what was available a police cruiser in the area would keep them from trying to get into any others for the night.
Outside of locking my garage regularly (which my wife did constantly push me to do previously), what would you have done? Do you call or don't you? How do you determine or I should say where do you draw the line from prank to criminal act? Do you have a "social obligation" to call in order to possibly prevent a bigger problem elsewhere?
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts and comments.
6 comments:
Lock your doors and call the police. One would hope that it was just some unsupervised and bored teens, but it may have been a ploy to see if you were home.
As the mayor has pointed out several times, this is not Mayberry. Besides it will give the police more reason to stay out of their uninhabitable offices.
I do think that is all it was, and I think what scared them off was the site of my garage.
I'd been working on a project and had wood and debris scattered through 2/3 of it, pushing other items to the front - there was no way to safely navigate that space in the dark.
I think the officer was amazed that I could determine nothing had been disturbed - at least not by me.
Thanks for taking a sip! And keep your doors locked - kids are bored at the end of summer, which is when they tend to cause the most trouble.
Kids used to ring my doorbell all the time at my estate on top of the Army Navy Store. It never bothered me unless I was in the middle of a shower. They're probably still ringing the bell but the damn thing is broken.
That stuff doesn't really bother me. I know most of them and they're ok. But I don't think there's anything wrong with being cautious.
It occurs to me this behavior is cyclical in nature. Over 17 years there have been similar incidents. Obviously there is no supervision at home for these kids.
I've mentioned a block watch to several people over the years. Maybe it's an idea whose time has come. Really, can we expect the police to watch out for us all the time?
I disabled the doorbell when I moved in. I hate doorbells. In the summertime, when I leave windows open during the day with just the screens, I leave a radio on in the house to create the illusion that someone is home. I always lock the garage. I think you should always call the police when something is fishy. Even "innocent teens" steal things sometimes. Also, you shouldn't smoke.
Since posting this I've found out that two other nearby residents, had the same thing happen, but much later in the evening (actually very early morning). One called the police, the other didn't.
Connect with one another, share information, solve problems.
Obviously this is not an isolated case, and I still think it is probably bored kids, but it is a problem.
Short of an organized block watch, simply keeping your eyes (and ears) open, taking note of what is happening, and, yes, calling the police when you see suspicious activity will all help.
I think in this case it is going to take really bad weather or the police catching these individuals to stop it, because there is apparently no parental supervision to speak of.
For those on and off line, thanks for sharing your insight and information.
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