Friends Fall Victim to Home Invasion by Predators
November 1, 2007 by Randy
Filed under Crime, Friends, Photography, family
For my blog’s regular readers, do you remember when I went to Disney last week with friends? Some of those friends are a single Mom and her three kids. I have known them now for little over a year and we have become good friends. I really got to know her kids that day at Disney and they are a delight. There is two boys and a girl. The oldest is a boy of 10 years old, the girl is 8 and the youngest son is 5.
Well part of the discussion that day was about how this Mom was awakened earlier in the week by a noise and she thought someone had tried to get in her home because a door beep-beep-beep went off and she found one of the doors slightly open. She thought it might have been one of the kids and just put the alarm fully on “just in case.” She told me this at Disney and we all were encouraged when she said she has been setting the alarm to full alert at night ever since.
Then, the following Saturday, all hell breaks loose.
That following Saturday night, last Saturday, in the wee hours of Sunday morning a man broke in and crawled through a bathroom window next to the 8 year old girls room. It is the only window not monitored by their security alarm. She says she woke up and saw a man dressed in black (the picture above is the composite sketch from the police) and she asked, like a kid would, “Who are you?” and he tied her mouth and told her to shut up repeatedly. She said that he just waited, looked out the window, and said something along the lines of “where is he?” and for some reason he left the room and the rope used to gag her came off. She cried out when he left the room, “Mommy! my throat … mommy my throat!” and Her Mom woke up thinking her daughter had a sore throat. She came out of her room to see the man run back toward the girls room and her son was laying in the floor of the living room (he had fallen asleep there to get away from the youngest one’s snoring.) He was ok.
Mom started screaming and ran outside screaming for help. She immediately went to the man next door, a War Veteran and they got the kids and called the police. When she ran out the door the alarm was tripped and going. When Brinks (her security system provider) couldn’t reach her they called her brother-in-law (another friend of mine) and the police.
When the man ran back toward the girl’s room he did so to crawl back out through the window he had come through.
It took the police 30 minutes to show up. They found prints everywhere and dropped evidence (the rope and a flashlight.) They are telling her that the lab tests on the evidence could take 5 months to two years to get back and that she should be happy if they get them back in eight months.
Happy? The man broke into her home TWICE in a week and others are saying that even since then they have seen a van casing the house and last night someone bothered the dogs in the neighborhood and a light sensor behind the house was on at 3 am last night. An 86 year old woman was raped, not exaggerating, in the same neighborhood yesterday. The composite of her attacker is much like the one listed here.
There are 250 sexual offenders in a five mile radius of this home, 79 in three miles and 15 within a one mile radius.
Happy to wait eight months for lab work? I think not.
You won’t see this story on CNN because nobody was brutally murdered or kidnapped. Thank God! But my friends are victims nonetheless. The trauma is setting in as the days progress and it is heartbreaking to watch.
I wasn’t going to blog about this because it just didn’t seem right to do so. However, today, the Mother did an interview with a local news station because she wanted to raise awareness in the area to help protect others and hopefully catch the guy. As soon as I find the coverage on the web I will add links here. So far I haven’t seen any. I am not mentioning their names because she wants to protect the kids. She did the interview today anonymously and when I asked about blogging she thought it was a good idea.
The other picture in this post is a drawing the little girl made of her attacker (you can click on either of the pictures to see the full image.) Her Mom told the reporter, “that isn’t something you ever would want your child to draw” and she started crying.
The brave little girl cried out even though she had been threatened. She is my hero because who knows what would have happened if she had not yelled out. Mom is my hero too because she not only raised the alarm loud enough to wake the whole neighborhood, she showed wisdom in crisis. Plus, it has to be said, Brinks security system did a great job. They certainly reacted faster than the police.
Isn’t it sad when you have more faith in a remote security system and your neighbors than you do the police? Well, it’s not sad but it should be that you have complete faith in your neighbors, the security system AND the police. The mother even reports that the sketch artist treated her daughter with disdain because he had to work through his lunch break to get the composite done.
Something has got to be done. 250 sexual offenders in a five mile radius, an elementary school right there, at least half a dozen neighbors and Brinks calling … and it took the police 30 minutes to show up.
::: sigh :::
As usual comment however you see fit. But If you would like to leave a blessing in the comments, for this family, please feel free to do so. I will pass them on to the Mom. Since this is a public blog it might be found by other victims as well.
Technorati Tags: Sexual Offenders, Home Invasion, Predators, Crime, Brinks
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My prayers have been with you about the “difficult” but I’ll add specific prayers for the man/men to be found and for the health and welfare of the family.
Little family, may God continue to reveal His protection to your home and His help for your success. God, take care of their tender hearts.
:::sigh:::
This is very heavy. I, too, am praying for this dear brave little family. May their home be surrounded by chariots and angels of fire and may the Lord provide healing as only He can.
In the mighty name of Jesus Christ I pray a hedge of protection around this family. I pray that He shall give His angels charge over you , and in their hands they shall bear you up. Father God protect this innocent family and I pray Father that the perpetrator be caught. Father your words tell us that you put the authority in place in our government and by faith I know that you will alert the right policeman, detective, or sheriff to the exact location of this evil man. In Jesus Name Amen!
I’m sorry to hear of your friends’ violation. Frustrating and terrible.
Please don’t take this as “piling on,” or as blaming the victim, but the truth is that the police aren’t there primarily to protect homeowners from crime. They are there to investigate crimes after the fact. It’s homeowners’ responsibility to protect themselves by honoring the Second Amendment.
thank you for the concern and blessings everyone. I will make sure to let them know. These comments and the ones on facebook have been very kind toward the family.
Ted, I don’t see it as “piling” on at all. I am glad you broke this out to general principles and I totally agree with you.
My only beef with the police is the response time was terrible and the feeling of the family as being an inconvenience to the sketch artist. Plus, the police just seemed to only add to the despair. If it is lack of resources … what can be done to correct it? That’s probably the source of frustration coming out in the post.
I am all for legal and responsible gun ownership for self defense.
Thank you all so much for taking the time to comment.
Originally I was going to recommend the lady taking gun training classes like offered here in Florida but with three kids 10 and under, one would really need to keep any guns under lock and key and in such a high stress situation, it would be quite difficult, if not impossible, to unlock a gun from a safe, drawer or even a trigger-lock effectively and in a timely manner. So with that in mind, I suggest the following: increased security measures first and foremost. More secure windows - ones harder to jimmy open with break-resistant glass. Secondly, keep non-lethal weaponry in strategic places. Pepper spray, baseball bat (aluminum or composite as opposed to wood - lighter, stronger and less breakage), spring-loaded whip-stick (if legal to own in your area - in some places it is illegal to own one) and possibly some sort of stungun (although if your allowed to own one it may not be wise with kids in the home).
Since this has been ongoing, I strongly suggest starting a neighborhood watch program in conjunction with the police department. I would assume they have some sort of program available.
My prayers and throughts are with that family. I am in a unique position having family and friends in various levels of law enforcement. In fact, I’m the only one in my immediate general family of one brother and one 1st cousin that ISN’T a sworn law enforcement officer. But ironically I just got a job working for a law enforcement agency in a non-sworn position.
Hey Carl, all great suggestions. I will pass them on.
I am curious about the snapping-spring-locked-stick whatchamacallit. Sounds horrible.
Here’s a URL to see the baton I’m talking about. I wasn’t sure by what name it’s commonly referred.
http://www.defensedevices.com/spring-baton.html
Oh… I have seen those on the news. Tough stuff.
Let me add to what Carl wrote…. You should also leave your outside lights on all the time, and even consider adding more lights (including the kind that come on when they detect motion). We have 4 bright fluorescent lights on around our home — we just leave them on all day.
That’s also good. They had motion detector lights but the dude disabled them.