Efforts Made to Prevent Crimes
Brent Shockley points out the window where someone entered his shop. Glenn M. Sides
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To Brent Shockley, the small coffee table outside his business was nothing more than a worthless piece of furniture. In hindsight, it turned out to be very costly.
Shockley said he thinks the table was used by someone in February to break into his business, The Coffee Cabin in Southern Pines.
"They stood it on its side and hopped through the window," Shockley said.
Shockley, a co-owner of the business, said the thief made off with $150 cash that was left inside the building overnight after an apparent weekend break-in. He reported the incident Feb. 6.
"They only took bills, no coins," Shockley said. "Whoever it was, they knew what they were doing."
The Southern Pines Police Department is trying to do more to help businesses and homeowners avoid being victims of crime.
Bob Temme is the community services coordinator for the department. He works with homeowners and business owners to help make properties safer through a program he calls Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design.
Officers will come out and do a survey of the business or home and make recommendations to the owners about things they can do to improve the safety of their building and surrounding property. The survey often takes 60 to 90 minutes.
"When you go to your business every day, you don't see things that are there," Temme said.
Old furniture, rocks, bricks or other heavy objects that are used to prop open back doors during business hours can be used to gain access to a building if those objects are left outside.
Other things Temme said business owners could do is to remove things such as signs and posters from windows to limit obstruction of views.
"Putting up large posters cuts down on natural surveillance " Temme said.
Covered windows make it harder for police officers on patrol to look inside for possible suspicious activity.
Keeping areas well lit is another way to increase visibility and make it harder for criminal activity to go unnoticed.
Shockley, who has been in business less than two months, said he is changing the way he operates in order to prevent future problems.
"I'm not leaving money in the place overnight anymore, and we are looking at investing in an alarm system and security cameras," Shockley said.
Janet Fowler, owner of the Sandhills Feed Supply in Southern Pines, said she was victimized by what she believed were a pair or trio of individuals working together. She said those individuals entered the store during regular business hours, distracted an employee and managed to make off with an estimated $700 in cash.
Police would not comment on the incident specifically, saying it was still under investigation.
"Crime is not something that is solved in 60 minutes like it is on television," said Southern Pines police Lt. Rodney Hardy. "I can say we are exploring all our leads and using all the resources available to us."
Hardy said Southern Pines is safe, when compared with other towns of similar size. He said that fact can sometimes give residents and business owners a false sense of security when it comes to crime.
"Sometimes they are lulled into that 'it-can't-happen-to-me' mindset," he said.
Hardy encourages businesses to make sure they are doing everything possible to prevent crimes from happening, such as having security cameras and alarm systems, having multiple employees working at the same time and keeping all doors and windows locked.
"The main thing is that you have to be aware of your surroundings," Hardy said. "If someone comes into your business, make eye contact with them and address them as soon as possible."
Temme echoed Hardy's statements.
"Greet people right away when they come into the store," Temme said. "Let them know that you can identify them. Don't leave them alone in the store and offer to hold their packages for them."
Shockley said Southern Pines police came out and gave him tips to make his business safer.
"They were very helpful," Shockley said. "I just wish I could have learned in a different fashion."
Contact Tom Embrey at (910) 693-2484 or by e-mail at tembrey@thepilot.com.
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Comments
TooHot 3 years, 2 months ago
Lock the window, holmes. Duh
elguapo9 3 years, 2 months ago
The property crime rate in SP exceeds the national average. Barney Fife and Andy Taylor need to step up to the plate and get their head out of the sand.
ladylane 3 years, 2 months ago
TooHot have you never heard of windows being broken when they want to get in they will. As for Barney and Andy I'm sure they have their hands full at times and are doing their best. Community watch works as well.
elguapo9 3 years, 2 months ago
http://www.city-data.com/city/Southern-Pines-North-Carolina.html
Scroll down till you get to the crime statistics. SP is double the national average, which we are combating by having 2/3 the number of officers per 1000 residents that the rest of the country has.
Tom_Embrey 3 years, 2 months ago
@elguapo9
Thanks for the heads up. I think those stats are from 2008, so they may be a bit out-dated, but certainly a starting point. Will look into it.
CSmithson 3 years, 2 months ago
@elguapo
I am not arguing against the numbers, but looking at rates per 100,000 does not tell the whole story. We are a small enough town that just a handful of people or crimes can make for a statistical "crime wave."
-There was one murder in 2008. As you cannot have fractions of a murder, that one murder put the town over the national average.
-Included in thefts are things like shoplifting or purses getting stolen out of cars while people are shopping. Southern Pines and Aberdeen have the bulk of the retail for this part of the county. If, like Pinehurst or Whispering Pines, you have hardly any stores, you don't have much shoplifting or car break-ins. Do Southern Pines and Aberdeen get credit for the populations who live in WP and PH but shop in SP and AB? No. I'd bet the rates would go down significantly with that figured in.
-In 2003, there was a huge increase in auto thefts. One would think a car theft ring moved into town. Most, if not all, of that increase was due to ONE person who stole lots of cars from people who had left the keys in them. People feel so safe here that they helped increase the crime rate by leaving their keys in the car and making it possible for this guy to steal them. I know one of the people who had their car stolen that year. It was actually stolen twice, probably by the same person, and yes they left the keys in the car both times.
The numbers are the numbers, but they don't tell the whole story.
None 3 years, 2 months ago
@CSmithson ~ I would be more than happy to prepare a statistical analysis for you based on current cumliative data....
CSmithson 3 years, 2 months ago
@Toda
By all means please do. A quick look at the info SP, PH, AB, and WP on the Citydata site leads me to believe that when one combines the property crime information of all four towns in "The Pines," the statistics end up being more towards the average to below average in crime rate.
None 3 years, 2 months ago
Chris ~ do you have a link for Citydata? I would need the raw data sent to the state and feds for crime reporting to plug into the formula to produce quantitative analysis. Would you want the mean to reflect four municipalities? Or use a median for the average?
elguapo9 3 years, 2 months ago
Chris; If you click on a specific category (say, thefts), it will update the chart below so that the chart is specific for that type of crime. From this, you can see that while we are about average for murder, we are way above average for theft. This is what you would expect for an area such as ours. We suffer from a rash or property crime, not violent crime. The local PD is fond of saying that 'it's just a bunch of kids', and sweeping it under the rug.
I could go on and on, but you get the point.
Amazed 3 years, 2 months ago
here's a link to an exerpt of a documentary about the crack problem in one of our neighboring communities...Hamlet. I WILL WARN YOU THERE IS SOME VERY STRONG LANGUAGE:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2z2iDAhcDc
they are every where...small towns...big towns...rural towns..urban towns. This is a national crisis...and because it deals with addiction, there are no simple solutions. Give the local LEOs a break and leave them to do their jobs. You complain that there are huge amounts of unlawful, "profiling" stops made by our local LEOs but then you complain that the crime rate for burglary is high. You can't have it both ways...
elguapo9 3 years, 2 months ago
Circling is right. When those crackheads run out of money and need to steal something to hock for more crack money, where are they going to go? There's nothing of value in Hoke county, so they go to Moore County and steal anything that isn't nailed down (and sometimes is, like your heat pump).
Ghadzhookz 3 years, 2 months ago
Perhaps we should take more initiative to assist Police by installing surveillance, utilizing the second amendment, always travel with someone, etc. Unfortunately, crime will probably always exist. Preventing crime is not as simple as locking our windows at night. What they left out of this story is that the criminal broke the window by throwing a rock through it. Police, I think, need our help as much as we want theirs. The Police are not the only force to prevent or deter criminals. Everyday citizens are the main artillery when it comes to crime prevention.
My true point: Do Police prevent crime? It does not matter how much funding Police get, how many new cars, or how many new members of the force join- Crimes still occur. So! (Here it comes again) The responsibility of preventing crimes, I think, falls on citizens protecting themselves. However, we pay the public servants for a reason. I do not condone "vigilante justice." If you know of a crime, inform the police and tell them everything you know.
Ghadzhookz 3 years, 2 months ago
@Expatriate: You make a good point. Government and some politicians are making our basic rights harder to protect on our own. Still, I think I would rather be caught with security systems and the tools necessary to protect myself than caught without them.