For most people, a home is more than just a place to live. It`s a place to feel safe, secure and sheltered from the danger and uncertainty of the outside world. That`s how Jenny Smith (not her real name) and her family felt until last winter, when their Deerfield home was invaded by a thief who broke in early one morning while everyone lay asleep.
”My kids have real fears now about someone getting into the house. It`s not the material loss that irritates me the most, it`s what this has done to their sense of security,” she said.
The break-in happened about 4 a.m. Smith remembers waking to the sound of the family`s golden retriever running across the wooden floors, followed by the sharp slam of a door. Still groggy, Smith thought at first her husband or son had gone jogging, in part because she glimpsed a shadowy figure going down the driveway. It took her a few minutes to look around the house and discover that, though the dog was missing, everyone else was still in bed asleep.
”I was walking around and I realized that I was walking in puddles (of melting snow). I got to the French doors, and they were standing wide open. That`s when I finally figured out what had happened.”
Smith roused the family and called the police. ”When they came in, they brought the dog with them. She`d apparently gotten out of the door behind the burglar and chased him. She loves to run, and I thought she was probably long gone, but the police found her at the end of the driveway, standing guard,”
Smith recalled.
A check of the house revealed that Smith`s purse, which had been left in the kitchen, was the only thing missing. Smith believes the 75-pound retriever may have scared the thief before he could grab anything else. ”I think he entered at one end of the house and she was at the other. She probably didn`t know he was there until he got to the next room. Retrievers are very friendly, but even though she never barked, she must have sensed something was wrong,” Smith continued.
Within hours of the break-in, the Smiths had summoned a locksmith to put better locks on the home`s sliding doors as well as on the French doors through which the thief had entered. ”With good locks, and the dog as a deterrent, I would have been happy, but my husband insisted we also get an alarm system,” she said. ”I think he was even more upset than I was because this had happened and he`d slept through it. He felt he should have protected us somehow,” she explained.
The Smiths` two younger children were also obviously frightened by the incident. ”It was so hard. How do you explain that kind of thing to your kids? During the weeks it took until the alarm system was in, they were afraid someone might get in and hurt them,” Smith added. The oldest of the Smiths`
three children never voiced his fears, but his mother subsequently found that he`d hidden a knife under his pillow for protection. The knife vanished once the security system was in place.
The thief eventually was caught, and the Smiths have gotten accustomed to life with an alarm system. ”I guess you could say it`s a healthy crutch. It makes the kids feel better to know its there,” she said.
Burglaries occur about 10 times a day in Lake County, according to Illinois State Police statistics. For many people, a home security system acts as ”an electronic psychiatrist for their nerves,” said Keith Fisher, owner of Keyth Security Systems Inc. in Highland Park. ”Once someone gets an alarm, they will never live in another home without an alarm system. It`s something you become very dependent upon, if only to look at the little red light blinking to know that it`s working. It gives you peace of mind,” Fisher continued.
The key is to get the right type of alarm system for each residence.
”The essence of an alarm should be designed around your lifestyle, not the other way around. You don`t want to become a prisoner of your security system,” Fisher added.
Alarm systems are available in a wide range of prices, starting with the $99 specials widely advertised on television and in newspapers, up to many thousands of dollars for the elaborate systems designed for the biggest homes on the North Shore.
A good quality system can be purchased beginning at about $1,200 for an average home or for $2,500 to $3,500 for a larger house, Fisher said. Overall, alarm systems have become more affordable in recent years because of technological improvements and because they`re being mass produced to meet the growing demand, Fisher said.
Labor costs are also lower because the new, wireless systems can be installed without running new wires through walls. Residents in Lake County`s well-to-do suburbs are ahead of the rest of the country when it comes to security systems.
Nationwide, about 15 percent of residences are equipped with alarms; in this area, it is probably 30 percent, Fisher estimated. Although many people fear being awakened, like the Smith family, by a burglar, the truth is that most break-ins occur when the family is not home, Fisher noted.
During busy parts of the day, when people are going in and out frequently, switching the alarm on and off becomes an annoyance, so most people arm their systems-typically by punching a code onto a keypad-just when the house is empty and at night before going to bed.
Alarm systems can be designed with a variety of sensors to indicate when a door or window is opened, if glass is broken, and to detect motion, heat, sound or a combination of any two. When a security system is set off, it may turn on all of the lights in the house and sound an audible alarm. It also will send a silent alarm to either the police or a security firm monitoring office. When a private monitoring office receives an alarm, the house is called to determine whether the alarm is valid, prior to notifying police. Homeowners are given passwords to use in the event of such calls.
Many security systems include bedroom ”panic buttons,” which can be activated by a touch and will result in police being notified immediately.
In some communities, residents can pay to have their alarms hooked up directly to the local police station, which requires a separate phone line. Whether the alarm goes to the police or a security firm, though, there is a monthly monitoring fee.
Some more expensive systems will even pinpoint in which part of a house the alarm was triggered-information the monitoring company passes on to police.
One of the newer innovations is the radio-wave alarm system with a battery back-up. Instead of being dependent on telephone and electric lines, which might be vulnerable to a burglar, a power failure or the whims of nature, these systems transmit their alarms over a special radio frequency.
The police who answer burglar alarms have some new technology at their fingertips as well. Enhanced 911 systems can quickly show emergency dispatchers, on a computer screen, all sorts of relevant information on the home in which an alarm is activated. And, in Lake Forest, even the squad cars are equipped with computer terminals. ”When an alarm goes off, the information is transmitted over the radio waves to the computer terminal in the car, so it`s not broadcast on a scanner where someone might hear it,”
Deputy Chief Gary Wieczorek said.
The computer technology also saves the officers some time when the call is cleared, Wieczorek noted. ”All the officer has to do is punch a button and the report is filed automatically. No paperwork.”
