By Sherry McCourt, CFE – McCourt and Associates

From good old-fashioned locks to high-tech electronic countermeasures, there’s much more to real home security than having a monitored alarm system.

An extremely common form of home invasion is the “push-in” robbery. In this scenario, one criminal shows up at your door pretending to have legitimate business, to be lost or seeking emergency assistance. As soon as a member of your family opens the door to see what he wants, he shoulders his way through, often accompanied by multiple armed companions. The person at the door is commonly the first to be brutalized in this type of assault.

The first line of physical defense of your home should be solid doors in solid frames with good locks.

Two of the most useful defensive items are intercoms and remote switches.

Intercoms let you communicate with family members in other rooms. They also allow you to project your voice into other rooms in the house without giving your own position away. Intercoms can, if budget and family privacy views allow, offer the option of listening to what is going on in any room in the house.

Remote switches for interior or exterior lights can be activated from a radio console, which should be kept near the door of the “safe room.” (The safe room is a “fortified” room the family understands will be the gathering point for all members if security is breached by intruders.) These switches allow you to control light in any room in the house. You can keep yourselves in the invisible darkness, while lighting up the intruders and denying them much of the concealment they want.

Imagine that you are the intruder. You are two rooms into the house when the lights start going on and off around you. A disembodied voice booms, “Intruders! Do not move! Police are coming! The technology required for this level of home security is surprisingly affordable.

Let’s assume that the above stated scenario happens, let us also assume that we manage to escape from the intruders and lock ourselves in a room in our home other then the safe room.
Items such as spices (chili spice), salts, flours etc, in the kitchen are a great way to blur the intruder’s sense of sight making it easier for you to run. In the bathroom, the use of air freshener sprayed in their eyes or the toilet cleaning brush used to strike the throat or temple may allow you enough time to get away. Remember the main objective is to place enough distance between you and your attacker as possible.

There is absolutely no material object more valuable than the life of you or your family. Staying to defend your brand new DVD player will more than likely get you seriously hurt if not killed.

With the affordability of modern technology, there is no longer an excuse to open the door to someone you don’t recognize. Go beyond the minimum-recommended peephole and get a closed circuit video camera. This allows you to see the person at the door. Couple this with the above stated intercom system and you can now see, hear and speak to the person without jeopardizing your own safety.

A “monitored” alarm system can be one of your most reliable cries for help. With the option of a wireless panic button, you can activate the alarm system from anywhere in the house.

The security industry polices itself pretty well, but it’s still a good idea to get recommendations from the crime prevention board of your local police department.

Police dispatch, Patrol Division and your local crime prevention boards will know who the fly-by-night alarm salesmen are, and who installs alarms so poorly that they generate a multitude of false alarms.

There are other services readily available from almost every local police department. You can request what is called a “CPTED survey.” A trained officer and / or civilian will be sent to your home to help you make sure you have the best possible defenses against intruders.

The officer will make recommendations for closing any neglected elements that could be exploited by a burglar. In addition, this officer and / or civilian will usually be happy to answer questions about burglary patterns and home invasions in your neighborhood and community.

Some additional thoughts in closing:

Close the blinds on your windows at night. A burglar will look in at what you have for the taking, just like when we go window-shopping.

Learn how to move around your home in the dark. Count how many steps it takes to get from your bedroom to external doors. Learn to quietly feel your way around. If you are up in the middle of the night to get a drink, or go to the bathroom, practice walking in the dark. This will give you the advantage over the intruder, you will be able to move quickly and undetected through your home and to your safe room or through an exit to safety.

For people who live in a two story or raised ranch homes, you may want to invest in a safety illuminated wand (glow sticks) with a spspare house key attached to it. In the event that you are trapped in an upstairs bedroom you can drop this outside your window for the local authorities use. You may decide to take this a step further and have your home floor plan shrunk and affixed to the “glow stick”, this way the local authorities have a key and a layout of your home. Hopefully you will be on the cell phone with police dispatch from your “safe room” and will be able to direct the officer’s right to the intruder’s.

In the end your most valuable possession is your life, a priceless, fragile spirit, to be protected. Understanding the potential threats is your greatest security tool. Following through with that knowledge is your armor.