Burglary and Robbery Prevention

Home Invasion and Robbery Prevention

Personal Home Safety

Home invasion robberies are scary and most of the victims have been seniors.  The crime itself threatens our belief that we are safest in our homes.  This page will help you improve the safety of your home and neighborhood.

Criminals generally look for opportunities that require the least effort and offer low risk and high gain.  Here’s how you can make your home and neighborhood less attractive to home invasion robbery.

Safety At Your Front Door

• Never automatically open your front door.  Make sure you know your caller’s identity before admitting him.
• If the person at your door is a stranger, ask for identification to be passed under the door.  If he is unable to do this, do not admit him.  If you do, you are asking for a home invasion robbery.
• It is advisable to have a wide angle viewer (peep-hole) in the door so that you can check a person’s identity without unlocking your door.

Home Invasion Safety

• All doors in your home leading to the outside should have dead-bolt locks.  A must for robbery provention.
• When away at night, leave a light burning.
• Do not leave a key over a door or under a mat.
• The single lock on a garage door is inadequate to keep home invaders from prying up the opposite side and crawling in.  Use a padlock.  But never leave it unlocked.  This is an invitation to have the padlock removed so that a key can be made, and the lock returned to its position.  Later, the burglar returns when no one is home and enters at his leisure, using “his” key.
• Mark your valuables and keep an accurate record of all your most valuable possessions.
• When leaving on a trip:

Stop all deliveries.
Connect a light to a timer.
Notify law enforcement and have a neighbor check your home periodically.
Have someone maintain your lawn.

Be a concerned neighbor.  If you see a suspicious person, car or situation, contact law enforcement.

Safety For The Apartment

• If you live in an apartment building with an intercom system to the front door, make sure the landlord keeps it in operating order.
• Never admit anyone unless you are expecting him or know him.
• Never admit anyone to the building who is there to see another tenant or to deliver something to another apartment.
• Anyone asking admission so that he can do some work for another tenant should not be admitted, but should be referred to the building’s manager.
• If you see someone in your building who looks out of place or is acting suspiciously, contact law enforcement.

What If It Happens To You?

If you are a victim of a home invasion robbery remember the following:

STAY calm.

COOPERATE.  No amount of cash or property is worth getting hurt over.

DON’T fight back unless you determine that you are in danger of being killed.  Instead, concentrate on getting information so you can be an effective witness.

LOOK carefully at the intruders, even if they are masked.  Is there something unique about them such as scars, tattoos, large nose?  What are they wearing?  Listen to everything they say, and how they say it.  Catch any distinguishing odors such as tobacco, alcohol, or aftershave.

Personal home safety means taking charge of your security at home and in the community.  Involve your whole family in creating a personal home safety plan that fits your family needs.  Get to know your neighbors and work with them to keep your neighborhood safe.

The Clinton County Sheriff’s Office is committed to making Clinton County a safer place to live.  But we can’t do it alone.  To keep our communities safe, we all have to work together.