Sounds like the offer for the side job install is one you should jump on. Sorry to hear about all your troubles, but at least the second time you weren't there. Not sure I'd be able to sleep if someone broke into the house with me sleeping twice in a row.
Of course kicking in the door this time seems odd since they didn't need to do that last time. Did you happen to move a hidden key or change the locks since the first time? Or did they just know that you were out of town so they didn't care about the noise?
Also can't wait to see pics of the safe to see what they did to it.
Hey Guys,
I'm sorry that I haven't been back to update, so here we go....
I really can't have a dog right now...I work overseas, and last year I was out of the country about 320 days.
I called the constable and he took the report and got all the serial numbers, didn't seem interested in finding them much....I was pretty unimpressed with that dude. I left and went to Dallas to do some stuff with a small gun company that I'm involved with. Spent the night there and was on my way to New Braunfels to do some other stuff and a neighbor called. This guy does security systems commercially, and said he'd get his guys to do a side job for me. Came over and was looking around and found the back door kicked in, blew out the door frame. Seems the perps came back the next night and had all the time they wanted. He called 911 and HCSO came over....told them that there were weapons in the house and the SO called for backup and they cleared the house. They told my neighbor that they couldn't do anything till I got there...which ended up being about 6 hours later after dealing with Austin rush hour traffic and the parking lot that was I10 undergoing construction.
Soooo....back door was kicked in, blew out the frame. They cleaned out the liquor cabinet, trashed my bedroom, stole a Ruger LCR in .22lr (last 4 of SN - 3952) stole all my watches, my suitcases....absolutely trashed the house. Broke one of my deck chairs.....it's a mess. I had Harris County SO here for a few hours last night and this morning, got 5-6 good prints off of some glass and some smooth surfaces. The crooks worked like hell to get into my safe. The locksmith was just here and he's confident that they did not get into it, but he won't be able to open it till Monday. Already talked to the guys at Browning safes and they are going to replace it if my insurance does not. I'll try and get some pics posted in a bit, but they are on my phone right now.
Today has been dealing with insurance, building lists of what is missing, had the locksmith over and he's coming back on Monday. Getting a new back door and frame tomorrow hopefully.
I'll do my best to monitor this thread and reply as I can, but as you can imagine, I'm keeping pretty busy at the moment.
Thanks for all y'all's thoughts and prayers....no one got hurt, stuff can mostly be replaced, but the peace of mind of being safe in one fracking spot on this rock....damnit, that's what I enjoyed about having a home.
I like the idea, but I wonder what the legality of that would be. I'd also be concerned about disabling the dog with the pepper. A dye pack might be more useful. "Mark" the intruders so that they can be identified more easily....12-gauge perimeter alarm...
I'm particularly fond of reloading the 12-gauge shells with cayenne powder.
They are quite illegal
That's agruable. I assume you're referring to PC 9.44? Mounted correctly, with a blank, at a distance, you could probably defend your use. The key is - defend - as you'd very likely be prosecuted in the right circumstance.
I misread. As blanks you would be ok.
They weren't he original burglars they didn't have keys, hence the kicked in door. Probably friends/acquaintances of the originals that heard them bragging.
These days of social media, word gets around very fast within teen groups (basically an online invitation goes out - what/where/when). It's not just inner school cliques anymore, word (about anything) gets put out and now you've got a multi-jurisdiction ring of possibilities. It happens with house parties that turn into drug/alcohol fueled disturbances, shootings, property damage, arrests, etc involving hundreds of individuals. They have the same MO. Kid's parents out of town, he invites 15 friends over, someone posts the address/date on facebook and that invitation multiplies exponentially. In 15min the neighborhood explodes from the mob influx. Same idea with info about scores.
Pardon my ignorance, but doesn't that leave a "paper trail" so to speak where investigators could track down who bragged and who read the brags?
Yep.
That stupidity is rampant these days occasionally has its upside...
Pardon my ignorance, but doesn't that leave a "paper trail" so to speak where investigators could track down who bragged and who read the brags?
Set up an account on leads online. They have a site where people can inventory their property and upload it to an online account with pictures and serial numbers. A lot of pawn shops have a similar account with leadsonline that allows investigators to search for stolen property. My old partner is now a robbery investigator and was telling me about this system last week. He has recovered a lot of stolen goods from pawn shops for his complainants by using leadsonline.
Yeah they still go into tcic/ncic as well. But the good thing about leads online is that when you set up you account you can enter in all of your serial numbers along with photos before they are stolen. A lot of pawnshops also have leads online accounts and enter in items. It seems like an effective tool.Aren't law enforcement officials still entering serial numbers for larger items (and firearms) in TCIC/NCIC?
Yeah they still go into tcic/ncic as well. But the good thing about leads online is that when you set up you account you can enter in all of your serial numbers along with photos before they are stolen. A lot of pawnshops also have leads online accounts and enter in items. It seems like an effective tool.
I don't know that I'd trust their security (online) without a lot of verification. Placing a list of my valuables somewhere seems like an invitation to thieves to break into that database to get a menu of places to burgle.