Someone might have been casing my house. What do you think?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

So Mrs D. heard a knock at our front door last night while I was downstairs. She saw some guy she had never seen before and with some urgancy in her voice, called me up to answer the door for her.

I go up and crack the door open. He looked like he was about 16 yrs old. His story was that he needed a ride home because there was a group of kids that were following him and were trying to beat him up. He wouldn’t give me his name and when asked where he lived, then told me he wasn’t from around here. We offered to call the police to give him a ride. He abruptly refused, said that he would be ok and started to walk off. We did manage to talk to him a little more, all the while trying to ascertain any kind specific information about him, but with no success… same story again. He did mention that he was trying to cut through yards in an attempt to lose the group that was trying to beat him up.

As we were calling 911, he left. So we told the 911 dispatcher our story and he sent a police officer out, whom we also told our story to. I explained that if his story was true, he would need some help. He said he would look around the area and try to find him.

So, I had this kid show up late last evening with a sob story, he wouldn’t give me any answers to any of my questions, and he also bugged out as soon as we mentioned the police. He definately was around 16 yrs old, but something just didn’t sit right with me about him. Also, at no time did he ever set foot inside my house. I’m sure I handled the situation correctly, but I still wonder… Do you think he was trying to scope out my place to rob later?

2

Could be, or maybe he’s mixed up with some gang or has an outstanding warrant or something. What’s your neighborhood like?

3

It’s a pretty nice neighborhood. Most everyone knows each other or at least has heard of each other. The neighborhood has many households with small and young children. It is not known for being a “bad” area, but we do see small groups of teens that we know live in the area walking around from time to time, though it has never been a cause for concern.

4

Do robberies happen very often in your area? If not, I wouldn’t worry about it too much.

I doubt if he was casing. Usually young kids are looking for a quick, easy score. They don’t want to mess around with home invasions-- too many variables to worry about. In a neighborhood in which the crime rates are low, suspicious activity is more noticible, so criminals tend to avoid such areas.

In reality, most criminals are lazy-- they don’t want a lot of hassles. For instance, your average breaking-and-entering theif will pass up a house with a dog, even if it doesn’t bark at them, because there’s no way of telling what the dog will do once they’re inside. It’s just not worth it-- they’ll move on to another location. Ditto with a house which has alarm signs, or is difficult to enter quickly.

Secondly, most theives don’t want to risk having the home-owners around when they’re trying to rob. The home owners may be trigger happy, or sharp-eyed witnesses, and most theives don’t want to hurt or kill anyone if they can avoid it.

Most likely, if you were really being cased, you wouldn’t know about it. Your average “punk kid” theif doesn’t do his homework. It’s the real “professionals” which do so, and they wouldn’t do something as clumsy as ringing the doorbell and blurting out nonsense.

5

It could have been a potential push-in situation. Had a woman or an elderly person opened the door the kid may have forced his way inside. But I wouldn’t be too concerned.

6

If you had let him in, he may tried to pocket something in a moment when you were distracted, say a credit card out of your wife’s purse or a wristwatch off the hall table, maybe a spare set of keys for later. He may have asked to use the bathroom in hopes of finding narcotic meds in the cabinet. I think you did the right thing in not letting him in. He probably wasn’t interested in attempting to threaten you but I can pretty much guarantee you’d find something missing (or you might catch him in the act) as a result of his visit.

7

Thanks for your insights. The situation just seemed very strange to me and afterwards, my mind started to wonder.

8

Yeah, i think Tikki and Otto have probably got the most likely explanations if the kid had something criminal planned. Casing the place by walking up to the front door and acting suspicious would only serve to get your description remembered for a later time. Might still be worth letting the neighbours know, just so they have a heads up to it if it is anything dodgy.

9

It’s a damn shame that, these days, anyone in trouble cannot simply walk up to the nearest home, knock on the door and ask for help. Mind you, I’m not criticizing your actions… I would have done exactly the same thing. I’ve had many people knock on my door for all kinds of nefarious reasons. Usually when they spot the Hounds of Hell barking and frothing at the mouth, they tend to back off and ask their “questions” from a distance. (I believe my dogs have protected me from being robbed several times – even though they’re just lickers, I’m betting most theives don’t know that. Must be why they ask me if they’re pit bulls. They’re not, but if you have to ask, then I’d rather you think that! Safer for me if you think my dogs will protect me.)

What I am saying is, if this was a kid genuinely in trouble, you did do the right thing by calling the cops. I just think it’s a shame that we’ve lost that sense of community in America and view conversations with strangers as something to be suspicious of.

When I was about 21, I was on my way to work at 6:30 in the morning when my car caught fire. I lived in a very small town which was about 25 miles from a decent sized city where I worked. Where the car broke down was right in front of a farm house, but there was nothing else but amber waves of grain for about 8 miles. I was looking at a very long walk – at a brisk pace it would take me a couple hours to walk home. Only time in my life I took a ride from strangers, who stopped to help me. And I was terrified they’d try to kill me the entire 15 minutes I was in the truck with them – even though they were perfectly nice good samaritan gentlemen. I remember looking wistfully at the farm house, wondering if they’d come to the door with a shotgun if I knocked and asked to use a phone to call someone to come and get me when these guys showed up and I decided to take my chances.

How sad is that?

10

Yeah, I know what you mean, Dogzilla. When I was 18 (a long time ago) that paranoia was already well-instilled into most of the population, and certainly in me. But I lost control of my car miles outside of town (inexperienced driver, not going too fast). Car wasn’t damaged except the tire was knocked off the rim, and I couldn’t get to the tire to change it for the serious weeds in the ditch I ended up in. I started walking. No cell phone back then, either. A truck came up behind me and slowed down. My heart was going a hundred miles an hour. The truck stopped. I almost started running. I looked up, and it was the husband of a church friend, who happened to be a tow-truck driver. I’d known him for years. I rode into town with him, and he came back with the tow-truck and got my car. Such a nice man. And what a huge relief. And yes, I’m aware even people you’ve “known for years” can be dangerous, but it turned out all right.

11

The world is not as mean as people think. But this kid was acting suspiciously.

My car broke down one time while I was driving home from college for a weekend visit. I had insufficient cash and no credit card for the repair bill. The guy working the counter at the convenience store where I broke down loaned me the $100 for the repair service so I could go on home.

I paid him back on the way back through and my folks added him to the Christmas Card list for a few years. He didn’t even seem surprised when I showed up again with the money. I’ve given stranded people rides home, even to “bad” areas of town with no harm. There are bad people in the world, but most of us aren’t.

12

It is unfortunate and times today are much different than they were even 25 years ago which is why I try to do my best to be as helpful as possible in situations like this. That doesn’t necessarily mean that I should be a sucker though. Yes, I will be happy to help you out, but I’m not going to be a victem either. So if that changes the way in which I offer my help to people, then so be it.

13

I know. I know. You have to protect yourself and I’m constantly reminding myself, “Ted Bundy was a really nice guy…” I blame our suspiciousness on him because he operated by pretending to have a broken leg, or in need of some sort of assistance, or he hitchhiked until someone felt sorry for him and picked him up, so he could kill 'em. Before freaks like Bundy, people could hitchhike in relative safety and strangers would stop on the street to help each other.

Once a guy banged on my door, clearly upset, and said he’d wrecked his car and could he use my phone? I poked my head out the door, saw a smashed car at the end of the street and brought the phone out to him. Sure, I’ll be helpful, but I’m going to be careful at the same time. FTR, he was totally understanding about why I wouldn’t let him in my house. I’m sorry man, you’ll have to use the bathoom at the gas station up the street, and you can call Tokyo on my phone… as long as you stay outside my home, we’re cool.

It makes me a little sad sometimes. Even because I know the world isn’t quite as mean as we think sometimes. This is why we should kill our televisions – sometimes the nightly news will lead you to believe that your hometown is far more violent than it really is. (Watch Channel 7 News in Miami once or twice. It’ll make you scared to walk out to your car.)

I thought of another time I got a flat on a freeway exit ramp. I barely managed to get pulled over and once again, was stuck in the middle of nowhere. A semi driver stopped, changed the tire for me, and sent me safely on my way, refusing to accept anything besides a heartfelt thanks. Another time I missed a curve on a dark and stormy night, and plowed my car into a mudbank, in Ohio in December. A very nice lady saw the car, pulled over and let me sit in her car with her until the cops came. I never got the names of any of these strangers who have helped me when I was in a real bind.

And how have I rewarded this Karma? Sorry, but I can’t let you in. I’ll pass my cell phone out to you, but I’ve gotta protect myself and my property. Even though most people understand and behave in the same way, it still feels shitty.

And I don’t necessarily think the kid in the OP was acting suspiciously. How many 16-year-olds would have the presence of mind to realize someone might think, “Is this kid casing my house?” I think he probably really was being chased and didn’t know what else to do. If I were being chased by a Roving Gang of Teenagers, I would do what he did – bang on the nearest door where lights are on and beg for help. However, calling police sounds like a good solution, so perhaps he was up to something illegal that got him chased in the first place. Doesn’t mean his intentions were to do harm to Dragwyr or his family.

14

Devil’s Advocate… I was thinking that children who are bullied are often afraid to report the bullies for fear of reprisals. This could be a similar situation. Perhaps he was afraid that giving too much information would result in a situation where he was obligated to give information that could incite the gang to further incidents?

15

My guess is he was probably being up front - if he had wanted to do something like a push in, he wouldn’t have stuck around as long as he did - especially a 16 year old kid. They tend to get jittery fast, and if they think you’re suspicious, they’re going to bolt. He was probably telling the truth, and had his own reasons for not wanting the police to get involved - prior trouble with the law, most likely. I don’t blame you at all for your choices.

It’s just sad that the choices you made are indeed the right ones.

16

On thinking about it, there was one other way I could have offered to help him, without him getting into the house. I could have gotten the cordless phone and offered to let him use it while he was outside to call somone to pick him up, then offered to wait with him on the porch for his ride. If he was being persued by other kids or something, I’m sure they would not bother him while I was there waiting with him.

Still, I think I handled it the best way possible, given the circumstances.

17

I had something very similar happen just a few weeks ago. I’m at home during the day with my baby. At about 2 or 3 o’clock, a woman came knocking at my door. She was about my age (early 30’s) and dressed in what a nurses assistant or other healthcare worker would wear - blue scrub pants and a colorful scrub top (cartoon characters or flowers or something). She told me where she lived (about 4 blocks south of me) and said she needed a ride to a local pancake house (about 5 miles south of me) to meet a friend. I said, “No, sorry, I can’t.” and she cheerfully said okay and left. She walked up the street.

A couple weird things -
I live in an apartment house with four apartments. It’s not obvious which apartments the cars belong to. We’re upstairs and she had to open a gate on our deck to get to my door to knock. Any of the other apartments would have been more easily accessible.

She walked north to find a ride to get her south. If it had been me, and I had been in the situation she described, I would have at least started off in the right direction. When she walked off, she continued in the wrong direction.

She didn’t knock on any other doors that I could see. I live in a beach area that has a ton of little apartment houses all crammed in on top of each other. She didn’t go to any of my neighbors’ doors. Just from where I’m sitting here at my computer, I can see 15 front doors.

My first thought was that she wanted to get me out of the house so that someone else could come in and take stuff. But, who knows…that doesn’t really make sense, either. Besides, all our stuff is crap…she’d be welcome to it!

18

Was your car parked out front.

I’m thinking more of a carjacking than a push-in situation.

19

Hmmm…similar situation with my mother-in-law. She heard a knock on the door and a young guy asked her if she would GIVE HIM A KNIFE because some kids were going to beat him up. She said no and just let it go. I asked her why she didn’t call the cops, and she said she didn’t want to stir anything up. She’s 81 and lives alone, so I can understand why she wouldn’t want to piss anyone off, but it sure was weird.

20

I was driving home in a rainstorm about a year ago, when my car slowly lost power, and then died completely. It was on a county highway, about 8 miles from the edge of the town I live in, cornfields on both sides of the road, with a farmhouse here and there. I was soaked before I had walked a hundred feet. Walking past the first farmhouse, I decided to knock. I figured the worst they could do was to pull out the shotgun and fill me full of lead.

Farm-wife was cooking dinner, farm-husband was in the next room. She opened the door without consulting him, invited me in, listened to my story, and handed me the phone. I called my wife for a ride. Farm-wife and husband offered me in the short few minutes I was there: a towel to dry off with, a bite to eat, and a ride back to my car. I declined all, but sure felt…humbled.

The world is NOT as scary a place as our handlers would have us believe.