Burglar hounds irate family
An Isipingo family's home has been broken into so many times by the same burglar that even their dog recognises him.
|||Durban - An Isipingo family’s home has been broken into so many times by the same burglar that even the family guard dog recognises him.
Yuvonne Anthony, who lives with her parents in Tangerine Grove, Orient Hills, posted a video of a burglar on Facebook.
People’s comments included sympathy, advice and questions, one of which was: why doesn’t the family get a guard dog?
Anthony replied: “Lol bought a German Shepherd, the dog does not bark at him because this guy comes so often.”
The family believes all the incidents have been committed by the same man.
In fact, the burglar has become so comfortable on the property that he has even been spotted on CCTV casually smoking.
And he has become so familiar with the layout that he has mastered out-manoeuvring sensor beams which would alert a security company to his weekly “visits”.
On Tuesday, Anthony’s father, Robbie Singh, 64, invited the Daily News to view CCTV footage of how the burglar snuck in and out of his entertainment area on Friday night.
But half an hour before a journalist arrived, a burglar kicked out two panels of the wooden roll-up garage door.
The burglar crawled into the garage and ransacked it. He piled several boxes of items on the bonnet of Singh’s SUV, which triggered the alarm.
The burglar made off with tools and old shoes. A passer-by saw the burglar throwing the box of shoes into nearby bushes. Singh later retrieved it.
“Over a period of time, items have been stolen from around my home and entertainment area. Thieves emptied out my bar fridge, stole a three-plate gas burner stove and a bicycle worth R8 000. I installed cameras and sensor lights outside my home four months ago,” Singh said.
On Friday night, he captured his first footage of the thief. Singh was watching South Africa take on Argentina on television in the Rugby World Cup when the lights went on outside.
He could not see anything at the time, but when he later viewed the CCTV footage, he saw the burglar exiting the enclosed entertainment area through a panel he pulled out around the canvas.
The sensor light came on and the intruder calmly walked towards the driveway. He hid below a low retaining wall along the driveway and once the light went off, climbed back into the enclosed area. Moments later he ran out, down the embankment and over a fence.
When Singh saw him a second time, he pressed the panic button.
He said the thief wanted to remove aluminium picture frames.
“He must have been on drugs. Other cameras caught him loitering around the property, oblivious to the sensor lights coming on. I did not want to confront him and put my life at risk,” Singh said.
Singh said he installed cameras indoors two years ago and an alarm system linked to a private security company.
“I paid R2 500 for a thoroughbred German Shepherd thinking it would be a guard dog.
“It was a bad investment.
“On my garage wall, I stuck a sign reading ‘Warning CCTV in operation’.
“What is a deterrent for these criminals?”
Asked on Facebook why they had not “set him up and then finish him”, Anthony wrote: “Would love to set him up, but he comes in the day as well. Unless we can be home for one week and not go anywhere it is really hard. We suspect he watches our moves. No, we did attempt in the day about a month ago but my dad got as far as Lotus Park Spar and lost him.”
Singh reported the incidents to police and the burglaries were under investigation.
Isipingo police had to deal with almost a burglary a day between April 2013 and March last year, with 360 incidents reported, according to official crime statistics.
Between April last year and March this year, 319 cases were reported.
Daily News
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