Tonight M had volleyball camp until 8:30pm, so by the time we got home it was dark. I pulled into the garage and went to the front porch to fix the chairs. M took the young ones to go into the house.
M- Mom why isn’t the alarm on?
Me- Should be.
M- It’s not on.
Me- Get out of the house.
She and the kids met me in front of the house and I ask her, did you set the alarm when we left? She says she did. We have lived here 7 1/2 years and have maybe forgot to set the alarm twice.
The door leading from the garage inside the house is now wide open, so I decide that if someone was in the house we had interrupted them and they may try to run out of the house, so I moved my kids down the block, behind some trees and then stepped away from them. Our front door is solid glass, I wanted to keep an eye on it, so I could see if anyone ran/walked by to exit the house. I also didn’t want to be to close to my kids if I needed to draw my gun and I really didn’t want to be near them if someone was gonna be shooting back at me.
Odds are that M forgot to set the alarm. Nothing appeared to be broken like a window or the front door and the alarm was off, so that would mean a code had to be put in. I could not think of anyone who would have the code. Even our best friends do not have it. The only possibility would be we have had people working here all week and I thought maybe one of them could have seen us turn it off, but that was very unlikely.
Even though I was 99% sure no one was in the house, I had my gun on my hip and the one thing I am mighty confident in, is my gun handling and shooting abilities I decided not to go in and to call the sheriff instead and here is why…
First, I am not trained in room clearing.
Second, going into the house seemed like looking for trouble.
Third, getting shot or killing someone in front of my kids is something I would really like to avoid.
I did think about going to a neighbor, but they have less skills than me. I thought about calling another person who has skills, but I didn’t want to bother anyone and thought I should try to handle it myself, so I called the non emergency number for the sheriff, explained my dilemma and when the very nice woman on the other end asked if I wanted someone to come check I said “Yes, I would appreciate that.”
Exactly 10 minutes later a policeman arrived. Parked his car and came over to talk to me. I was OC(I had a cover garment in my car, but I wasn’t wearing it because its hot here and I knew I was not getting out of the car. My car was in the garage and I didn’t want to go back into the garage to get it), so I walked up to him slowly and said I do want to let you know I am carrying. He said, “Ok fine”. “What’s going on?” I told him. He said, stay here, I will check the outside first and then go inside.
He did just that. Checked the outside for forced entry, then went inside the house. He announced himself with a very loud voice and then did his thing.
He came back out and said all was clear. He was very nice, very professional and didn’t give a flying flip that I was carrying.
He left, I got my kids settled and called my husband.
Couple of observations…
- I was calm. I was very concerned because it is odd for our alarm not to be set and we have have had a fair number of home invasions lately, but I was calm.
- My kids responded to everything I told them without question. My 14 year old was paying attention to what was off. She did not just fling the door open and walk in. She noticed the alarm was not set, stopped the kids from going in and alerted me.
- E is not great in a crisis. She kept saying, Is there another bad guy? Are we going to be ok? I need my gun. I suspect she will be in my bed tonight.
- I was prepared to fight.
So all is well once again here in AGirlland.
Very well handled, and perfectly rationalized. You took care of you and yours as should be. Way to go!
I did. I took care of my kids!
Discretion is the better part of valor.
🙂
A textbook example of how to handle a potentially very bad situation. Everyone’s training kicked in, including your children’s. Magnificent on many levels, from the initial recognition of “something odd,” all the way through to interaction with the police officer. Well done!
Thank you Steve.
Well done. Well done to the kids for noticing and for getting out without question.
Good reaction from the sheriff’s deputy too.
Very happy to see my kids coming along.
Wow, glad to hear all is okay, family safe and no one was in your house.
I’m happy to hear your eldest based on your training her was alert and stopped the younger children from entering the premises.
I am glad no one was inside either. Always visualize it and of course I always handle the bad guy, but I don’t want my home to become a “war” zone. I want it to be a place of refuge for my kids.
You’ve trained your kids well. Noticing the alarm was off, and saying something about it, is not something you’d expect.
She did good:) thanks!
Perfect!
Excellent response! And kudos to your daughter for being so observant.
Thank you
Very well handled. I’ve taken a course of solo room clearing, (Shivworks – AMIS) and I would never want to have to do it unless it was absolutely necessary. Stuff like that is best left to the professionals. As for the alarm, perhaps you could call the company. They might have logs on when it was activated / deactivated. And I hope the kids are doing okay!
Good idea. On the alarm. I will call. I did check it several times today to be sure when I set it, it stayed set and went off if tripped.
This is an excellent post. It’s important that we utilize the police in situations like this – that’s what they’re trained for. There was no sense in you going all Dirty Harriet when you could (and did) call in someone with the right training and experience to handle the situation.
Hope E starts feeling better soon – she’s going to have off and on episodes for a while.
Nicely Done! I don’t know if you did this or not, but I would have told the dispatch that you were carrying a pistol as well.
Thanks GunDiva. E slept through the night in her bed:)
Keads, I thought about telling dispatch. I was waiting for her to ask and when she didnt I didn’t. Wasn’t sure if I should have.
I advise students if they call 911 to inform them. Officers wheel up and the more information they have on a situation the better it goes IMHO. They don’t know who the bad guys or good guys are, but in your case having the kids with you probably made the difference. Again just my 2 cents. YMMV.
Yeah, if I was inside with an intruder I would have for sure, but your right, probably should have this time too. Thanks!
Nothing more to add that hasnt’ already been said! Excellent responses all around!
“First, I am not trained in room clearing.”
Just do like the cop. Loud voice and TELL THE SCUM YOU ARE GONNA RIP THEM A NEW … (just kidding.) but unless you have a partner I would not. Oh, and that goes for that one cop to.
“Second, going into the house seemed like looking for trouble.”
It would be.
“Third, getting shot or killing someone in front of my kids is something I would really like to avoid.”
Worse the scum gets ahold of your kids!
So yes, keep the roscoe handy and call the cops. You DO pay their salary so why not?
Good job.
Perfect response!
You keep being awesome, A Girl.
That’s the first thing my instructor said to us when we were learning to clear rooms – “Do you really need to go in there?”
You did great and so did your kids!!!