Robbery ARG

Lesson learned relatively cheaply, at least so far.

It appears that Saturday night we left our garage door open, and some @$$hole went in and stole my wife's purse from the car.

We found out when the credit card companies called to ask if we had visited 7 Wal-Marts that morning.

Spent an exciting Sunday calling around cancelling stuff.


Lessons learned

1) PAY ATTENTION- if we had not been distracted by the kids, the heat blah, blah- we would not have left garage open, nor left purse in car

2) calling banks on Sundays SUCKS

3) Buy locks that are easy to re-key- I have kwik-set locks, and was able to re-key them in 3 minutes......After buy the tool my kids lost sigh.

4) there are alternate good uses for Credit Reporting services- They make a nice checklist for figuring out what needs to be cancelled vs what you can keep.

5) having 2 accounts on payroll accounts is a nice safety net- the checking account had to be closed (Wife had checks in purse) and it was primary payroll account- Since I had secondary account set up, was able to get payroll re-routed same day

6) realized that we have no deadbolt on door from garage into house. It is pure luck that thief did not enter house. At least on laptop was on kitchen table.

Okay,
What preps do I do to avoid repeat of this?

Wow, that's a bummer. Does your wife normally leave her purse in the car? We have a big "pigeon-hole" thingy by our garage/house door where my wife and daughters leave there purses...and I leave my manbag. A quick glance makes it obvious if a purse/bag was left somewhere it wasn't supposed to have been.

-Blast

We have a little panel in house that tells us (via two little LEDs) whether the garage door is up or down. Handy little gadget.

Glad to hear they didn't come into your house.

I'd bait them in again and catch em on camera. Repeat the conditions of the first heist. Same car, same day of the week, same time of day. Except this time, have a good quality camera taking some really good face shots of the bad guys. It might take you a few weeks before they make their rounds through your neighborhood again, but like a racoon, they always come back for the easy pickin's.

Beyond that, I'd say a burglar alarm would do you some good, and maybe some better exterior lighting. A petty thief would probably be scared off from an audible alarm and lights. You can also integrate a garage door alert monitor if you leave the door open again that will chime inside your house. They even have garage door autoclosers now that will close the door after a certain period.

In our old hood, we had a neighbor who had retired and would stay at home for a week and then visit one of her kids in another city a week at a time. She returned home from one visit and opened her garage door and it was empty. The thieves had slowly chiseled around old cement blocks until they got enough to climb through, disable her alarm and then open the door and haul away all her stuff.
I bought a couple of those big Stanley wheeled job boxes that Home depot sells and some chain and locks. I started locking all my tools up and chaining everything to large bolts through the wall studs.
Sure someone with enough time could still steal stuff but it was enough that it would slow them down and make noise.
I bought a nice new steel door for the front and took the old steel front door and replaced the wooden back door into the garage with it. Then another exterior door between the garage and kitchen, then bought three sets of deadbolt locksets and had them key'ed alike and installed in all three doors with 4" desk screws into the studs.
Of course they then broke into my shed and stole the lawn mower and bicycles.
In larger towns no one even responds to alarms anymore due to too many false alarms, I used to try and call them in and only annoyed the dispatchers, the alarm salesmen who come around really hate me when I tell them that.

No, regularly her purse is in the house; I am almost glad it worked out this way; at least they did not appear to come in the house.


Yes, am considering the alarm system; wondering if they have one with automatic on/time schedule. We had one at last house, and it was nice, when we remembers to use it.

My wife's purse and credit cards were stolen too, but I didn't report it to the police or credit card company:
so far the crooks are spending less than she does

I hope this is not a thread hijack.

When a purse is stolen, there is not a lot you can do.
HOWEVER, as a banker, I see a major security gap that many women are subject to.

It is this: it is very popular for women to carry an "all in one" type "wallet/organizer" (my term, don't know the right one). In this single organizer is a convenient place for: cash, checkbook, credit cards, social security card, etc. and who know what else. I think these were designed by identity thieves. It gives them everything they need in one place.

You lose/have this stolen and you have major problems. Your identity is up for grabs. This happened to DW once when we were first married many years ago. She then switched over to separate checkbook, driver's license, and credit card carriers. If she lost one, she didn't lose everything. Only one was out of her purse at a time. Of course, they are still in her purse and if that goes missing. . .

Don't make it too easy for the bad guys. It's bad enough as it is.

That's all probably true, except for those of us with ADD.

If I had to separate everything, I would never find them, nor would I have what I needed when I needed it.

I have to have everything together that I need. And as soon as I walk in the door I have to place it on the shelf inside the door that is there for the purpose: purse, little wallet (for work, it has to fit in my pocket), cell phone (that's where the charger is, too), and keys.

For years people have told me that the weight of having a relatively large set of hanging from your car ignition all the time can damage the ignition. Maybe so, but I just don't have that option. OTOH, my old crate had its 26th birthday and has never had ignition problems. Maybe the newer ones are more delicate.

And carrying your social security card is just begging for trouble. You only need it rarely, and should know when those times are. If anyplace (like Macy's) asks for it as a source of identification, shop elsewhere.

Sue

What type of device is it and where did you pick it up? Sounds like a good item to install. I don't really want to integrate anything into my alarm system that makes noise, so this item sounds ideal.

I find that people tend to let down all their guards when things are festive, for example, at a Fourth of July barbecue and other similar gatherings. People leave cars wide open, leave valuables laying around, leave doors unlocked and wide open, etc.

Now that your "cherry has been popped", it will be shame on you if this same type of thing happens to you again. You don't have anymore passes to lounge around happy-go-lucky without any situational awareness. I recommend to be more aware generally. Lock doors. Keep an eye out. Get a good watch dog. Fire your current watch dog.

Then again, at some point, you can't totally avoid a highly determined thief. If the thief is determined enough, they'll eventually get you. As a practical matter, you can't eliminate the possibility of all theft. Hopefully, you'll only have to worry about petty thieves.

I hear you. I carry a man bag and do the same thing. I know it's not the best thing to do security-wise, but the downside of losing things or forgetting something at home discourages me from practicing better security.

Regarding the "all-in-one" effect- my wife does have book with all the other credit cards- Kohl's,Best Buy, and all the airline cards.... but its too big to carry, she keeps it in our office (THANK GOD)- now, how do I hide that......

It did remind me I need to remove my SSN from my wallet.

So-

- adding deadbolt to door between garage and house.

- investigating Alarm system

- double checking all doors/gates each night

- checking credit report for activity often

I've noticed a lot of people carry their SScard in their wallet and I was taught the same. It wasn't until I had kids of my own and got their ssn's that I saw the wringing on the rest of the paper you punch the card out from said "do not keep in wallet".
I have all my cards like that in my important documents binder in a gun safe bolted to the floor and wall in my house. For someone to steal it they would have to rip the safe off the floor, then get it down the stairs without squashing themselves

Some other measures that are cheap but effective.
- Add a high security strikeplate to the doorframe around the deadbolt ($6). The deadbolt may be strong, but the inch of pine that makes up the doorframe isn't. Six 3" screws going into the studs through a steel plate is another matter completely.

- Install security hinges on the door ($5). If the door swings into the garage, then the hinge pins are accessable from the garage. Pop those out and the lock won't matter. Security hinges halves lock to each other when the door is closed or make it difficult to remove the pin.

- I do a nightly walkaround the last thing before bed. A cheap and convenient solution to check the garage door is to put a fisheye door viewer ($5-$20) in the door. You can check it without letting in the cold. Also good for "what was that noise?" moments.

-Lastly. Not really cheap but effective. Use a credit monitoring service ($10-$20/month). They will alert you if anybody runs a credit check on you (e.g. Why is the BestBuy in Chi-town running a credit check on you when you haven't applied for card or a loan there?).

I do the same thing. I am forced to lock my car with a key, so I've made it a habit to attach my key chain to my EDC purse. (My wallet, glasses, etc, go inside the purse.) That's eliminated my forgetting my purse in the car but I do occassionally forget to put a bank card back in when I've jumped out for gas and just shoved it in the my pocket as I fill up. The purse then goes on a hook inside the front door when I get home.