Did I overreact?

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Onward Allusion

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So last night before going to bed, I'd noticed a car parked directly in front of our house. I reviewed our surveillance videos and saw that the guy pulled up around 10:00, sat there for a good 15 minutes, and even had a cigarette during this time. The guy (wearing a baseball cap pulled down) finally got out of his car and walked up the street and disappeared from my camera's view.

This was really suspicious as there are no other cars parked on our streets at that time of night and he didn't visit our next door neighbors or the house next to them. Not feeling right about it, I went out and took a pic of his car and the license plate. Did I overreact? I kinda feel like a "Mrs Kravitz" for doing this. :eek:

BTW, the car was gone in the AM and I didn't have time to review the videos.
 
Sounds like a boyfriend visiting someone that probably shouldn't have said boyfriend. Or it could be someone doing a b & e. Who knows?

Did you over react? No.

I probably would have called the police and gave them that pic with license plate number and a good description.
 
Recording make, model, and tag number, along with date and time, of a suspicious vehicle parked by your house is a routine, reasonable precaution.... so is calling your local PD if you thought it necessary. Most of the time it's never needed.

Of course I'm a retired cop who handled lots and lots of "suspicious" stuff that turned out to be perfectly ordinary.... as well as one or two that weren't anything ordinary at all.

I'd tell anyone to "trust your instincts" and follow up on them. Wish I had a nickel for every witness that said that they had a bad feeling about an individual or a situation (but of course did nothing until it was way too late).

Feel free to disredard this since I'm an individual that will never be allowed to sit on a jury and have more than a few memories I wish I didn't have....
 
Nope, did exactly the right thing. Pay attention to whether there was a break in around that time in your neighborhood.

I get checked out nearly daily at my kid's bus stop, Venetian blind Peepers, and school employees.

I don't know WHY a 6'5" shaven headed guy in dark clothing hanging around in front of a school after hours would draw attention. ;)

I don't mind it so much, people should watch out for their neighborhood... but after 5 years of the same routine, you'd think they'd recognize me by now.

It's a laugh when I greet one of them by Name and they stop dead as they approach me...

I've undergone federal background checks to be a Chaperone on field trips, but I still appreciate it when the staff checks me out to be sure.
 
Did I overreact?
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No. You under reacted by not calling 911 on a suspicious vehicle and behavior.

Burgler, stalker, drug deal, repo guy ????? who knows?

Had a call like that one time and it was a Private Investigator tailing a cheating husband. :)
 
You under reacted by not calling 911 on a suspicious vehicle and behavior.
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Guy sits in his car and has a smoke, and gets 911 called on him? :scrutiny:

Local PD, okay, if you feel the need. But 911? Really?
 
our surveillance videos
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Cool!
This was really suspicious
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I'm not sure I see that, but if it was, call the police.
I went out and took a pic of his car
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Why leave the safety of your home? If this was a bad guy, you have exposed yourself. You've given him an in to approach you: "What the heck are you doing near my car?"

If there is no problem with overnight parking on your street, and he wasn't doing anything illegal, not sure I would have done much besides (maybe) calling out from my porch: "Hey, can I help you?" when you first noticed him.
 
Better to over react than to not do anything. Several years ago my son, who lives next door, worked odd hour and sometime he would come by even around 10:00 - 11:00 if he saw lights on. Knock on the door and I thought it was him, turned out to be a young man that was nervous as a cat in a dog pound. When I opened the door his first mistake was to grab the screen door and started to pull it open. In a very deep and firm voice I informed him to Back OFF. He asked about using the phone to call his parents, I closed the door, locked of course, returning with phone in one hand and my 45 in hip pocket. I heard his end of conversation and understood he was wanting mom or dad to pick him up at same time his head was on a swivel. After he returned the phone he reached again for the screen door, his hearing must have be super sensitive, the sound of safety being released caused him to back off again. He left my porch and was wandering around in driveway when I noticed two cars on next street slowly moving with flashlight shining. Turns out he had strong armed his way into the house of a lady that has health issues and the two cars turned out to be County Sheriff cars. I was on the phone with County dispatch while they turned into my drive, again he was so lucky, my son was not home and he had hid in an outbuilding. Then he attempted to make his break down the drive way. After being TAZZED twice he gave up "wonder why". This is a very very small country town and messing around with any female will get you hurt in a heart beat. Not mentioning any names but someone in law enforcement gave that boy a lesson that can not be learned in a book. To this day he is a rock solid citizen and I doubt that he would even pick up a penny on the street. Over react " No" that is what the LEO's are paid for and its better to say sorry for any inconvenienced to the officers than to find out that some unthinkable happened.
 
Loosedhorse

Quote:
This was really suspicious

I'm not sure I see that, but if it was, call the police.
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The suspicious part was sitting there for a good 10-15 minutes and then walking up the street - not next door or even 2 doors up. There wasn't a car parked on the entire street.

Quote:
I went out and took a pic of his car

Why leave the safety of your home? If this was a bad guy, you have exposed yourself. You've given him an in to approach you: "What the heck are you doing near my car?"

If there is no problem with overnight parking on your street, and he wasn't doing anything illegal, not sure I would have done much besides (maybe) calling out from my porch: "Hey, can I help you?" when you first noticed him.
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Yes, I thought about it before I left the house. The video said it happened around 10 and it was close to 11 so I figured it was pretty safe, especially if he walked up the street. HOWEVER, 20/20 hindsight - I definitely should of had my wife cover me instead of lying in bed watching the camera feed OR just picked up the phone and gave the cops a heads-up.
__________________
 
It's also a decent habit if you're leaving your loved ones at the house, if you see something odd, someone watching you leave a bit too intently, Hit the speakerphone, let them know to be aware.

Mother in Law has let the dog out into the yard with very good timing in the past, He's a Landseer and patrols the fence line like clockwork, barks at anyone within a block.

Plenty of time to think about what you're doing when you get there... can't lose sight of the goings on outside your door in the process.
 
CALL 911, that was the first thing to do.

Going outside might have put you or your family in danger.

I am not saying you are a wuss,just that you have no idea what or who the other guy was.

AND if he had friends.
 
Some years ago I lived in a house in a small subdivision. The two houses directly across the street from me faced side roads, so if I looked out the front I was looking into the two abutting backyards. One night I heard a car with a bad muffler drive by a few times too many and looked out- the car stopped and parked directly across the street. People don't normally park at someone's backyard, they park out front. Two young gentlemen got out and walked down the street, turned right and went out of sight. I called the cops. While I was on the line they returned, walking a little faster than they did when they left, got in the car and drove away. I couldn't see the plate, but I described the car and mentioned the right taillight was out. The cops caught them about a mile away- their car littered with stolen radios and other stuff.

You didn't overreact, but next time call the cops. That's what they're paid to do. If it's a false alarm, so what.
 
Much of this depends on your neighborhood's usual activities. You can tell by the varied reactions. Some people see this as business as usual. Other people like myself wonder why the guy didn't just park at the person's house he was going to. If you are avoiding parking at someone's house in my neighborhood, it means you shouldn't be at that person's house. Plenty of room and no one ever parks on the street. Only you can judge that, and it sounds like it is abnormal. React accordingly because you live there, not us.
 
I like most of the responses about this situation. One additional thing comes to mind... the best defense any of us has is our neighbors. A nosy neighbor willing to call in something suspicious (or at least make a record of what they saw in case a crime is committed) is worth a lot. All those years ago as a young kid who wasn't always behaving I thought nosy neighbors were a pain. Lots and lots of years later, I make a point of looking out for my neighbors and hope they do the same for me.
 
You did fine. If it turns out a crime was committed in the area, you can provide LE with valuable information.

No. You under reacted by not calling 911 on a suspicious vehicle and behavior.
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I wouldn't call 911 on a suspicious activity; That's what the non-emergency line is for.

Out here in the sticks, it'd have to be more than just a bit suspicious to justify calling the sheriff.

I had a car parked down the road one night with markers on, kept looking and it didn't move, could see two occupants with binoculars (it was about 200 yards away). This was about 1 am. When better than a half hour passed, I decided I should investigate. Had my CCW, but it remained holstered and concealed the entire time; The only tool I employed was a flashlight. I circled around and approached the vehicle from behind, and shined the light in the driver window. I used the friendly approach, asking "Is everything alright?". Turned out to just be a local kid and his girlfriend, I advised them that it would be best in the future to find a turn off on a less populated road (mine is in a rural subdivision with 5 to 10 acre lots) and kill the lights.

Some may think this was not a good idea, but I'm sure both the kid and the sheriff would appreciate not having been bothered over nothing. If the car had sped off, however, I would have called the SO with plate and vehicle description.
 
Up to what you've done I do not think you've over reacted. If you had called the police, then I think you would have been overreacting.

Are you sure the guy was not talking on a phone while sitting there? Or maybe they wanted to hear the end of a ball game or talk show on the radio? I've done that.

Somebody unusual in your 'hood my be cause for being alert and aware. Not necessarily illegal and worth bothering law enforcement.

I know if somebody called the police on me I'd be highly honked off if I were detained and questioned by an LEO while going about my business because some ninny got spooked over my presence on the street.

EDIT: Now that I've thought about it I'm pretty torked up with how much the nanny state of mind has infiltrated many of you.
 
Definitely not. Once when I was in high school I happened to look out of my window to see someone pull up in front of our house and park a late model olds eighty-eight. The lady got out and grabbed a few things out of the back seat, and started walked down the street. I called the non-emergency police line and as it turns out the car was stolen. They sent out a unit right away and stated dusting for prints and even brought out the dog. Later I was summoned to be a witness in court, but the must have settled because I was never able to take the stand.
 
That is not an over-reaction; it is called good situational awareness. Your vigilance may even come in handy in the near future, should something shady happen to one of your neighbors.
 
CALL 911, that was the first thing to do.
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All LE Departments have a non emergency number as well. Unless you deem a guy sitting in his car smoking an emergency there is no need to call 911. Use the non emergency number and report the vehicle, the guy, and what he is doing. A car will be sent around to check it out.
 
All LE Departments have a non emergency number as well. Unless you deem a guy sitting in his car smoking an emergency there is no need to call 911.
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I'd say this. I would have called the non emergency number, given a description and once in a while kept tabs on it.
Good on catching it, too.

I do however think a lot of this is very situationally dependent. We can't sit here and point to one particular kind of behavior and say "This is suspicious and must be reported!" He could have very legitimately been a guy selling something and checking out his clipboard. Or the proverbial boyfriend who was waiting for mom and dad to leave. Or someone who needed a breather before telling their SO something ... all kinds of stuff.

In this case, who knows what was up? Best to at least have someone check it out. But let's not get to the point where we end up reporting each other to the police for "acting funny" or aggravating someone's personal life because we read online that "normal people" don't do such and such.
 
Something similar happened here.
A guy is parked in front for a very long time.
I note the car make and license without being seen.
Eventually he leaves.
The next day he's back, so I approached the car and, even before I could ask, he showed me his Private Investigator license.
He was on the job.
 
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