Thank you for the refresher on the importance of security and situational awareness, even in (especially in) our own homes.All,
Had an incident here in AA County in Edgewater. There have been pairs of people wandering the neighborhood with clipboards, somewhat nicely dressed, knocking on doors and soliciting. The usual stuff like siding, roof repair, BGE Home and so on. My wife and I have a very visible sign on our outer door that says "No soliciting. Do not knock. This includes UPS, Amazon and FedEx.".
I work from home and my office has blinds on it but I usually keep them slightly cracked. Early afternoon I hear a knock at the door and I see two men on my porch. Somewhat well dressed in polo and button down shirt, metal clipboards in hand. Apparently they can't read and I do what I normally do in such circumstances and ignore them and they'll usually go away without an answer.
This time I heard a new sound...
The sound of my doorknob being moved.
The speed at which I moved was impressive. The rifle came off its rack, to my shoulder, I cleared the corner and it was leveled on the door, my finger on the bolt release. No further activity and after about 20 seconds at the ready, I approached the door at the low ready and saw the pair moving to the next door neighbor's house.
I called my wife and she called the police. Two marked cars came out and interviewed several folks in the area. Including me over the phone. Turns out that several of my neighbors noticed them and several did mention hearing their doors being tried after the knocks including my next-door neighbor. There were two sets of people wandering through the neighborhood and we aren't sure if they were legit. I do not believe they were.
So keep your doors locked, folks. We've been told by the police it is not uncommon for would-be thieves to dress up nicely, go into a neighborhood and pretend to solicit in order to case an area for later robberies. It is not common but also not the first time I've seen questionable characters wandering around without obvious purpose. Especially when claiming to represent various companies but not wearing branded clothing or have valid ID.
Summertime brings more of this stuff out. Be vigilant.
Matt