911 response time

[CobyRupert]

:devil: Devil's advocate here:

Real crime of the century: A guy walks up to your house and asking to use the phone....and.......??? :confused3:

Your wife screams bloody murder, yells "Get the gun!" and calls the cops. Why?

Do you have "No Trespassing" signs?

You ask him to leave and he does (while you're making (very thinly veiled) threats about shooting him). OK. Done. What's the crime?

So, what was her complaint to the police? What was HER suspicion based on?

What did the police do? Arrest him for existing? Excessive tattoos? Failure to drive a car? Pedestrian-ing without a cell phone?

Sounds like there was only one party (not counting the cops you brought) bringing gun play and threats of violence to the scene and creating a disturbance.

 

[thepumpguysc]

I too have a vol. fire dept.. less than 2 miles away.!!
My garage/workshop caught fire a few years back..
The vol. fire dept FINALLY got there after passing the street SEVERAL TIMES..
THEN they stood there watching it burn & wetting the trees so it didn't spread..
I'm glad they finally showed up BUT "I think" it coulda been saved.. I wasn't a happy camper..
OH WELL..

 

[mark02tj]

:devil: Devil's advocate here:

Real crime of the century: A guy walks up to your house and asking to use the phone....and.......??? :confused3:

Your wife screams bloody murder, yells "Get the gun!" and calls the cops. Why?

Do you have "No Trespassing" signs?

You ask him to leave and he does (while you're making (very thinly veiled) threats about shooting him). OK. Done. What's the crime?

So, what was her complaint to the police? What was HER suspicion based on?

What did the police do? Arrest him for existing? Excessive tattoos? Failure to drive a car? Pedestrian-ing without a cell phone?

Sounds like there was only one party (not counting the cops you brought) bringing gun play and threats of violence to the scene and creating a disturbance.

I think you need to re-read the OP's initial post....

The guy didn't just "walk up to the house" - he was at the back door, not the front door.

The guy didn't "ask to use the phone" - from the OP's description, it sounds like he was at the back door and didn't knock and only came up with the phone excuse when the wife started screaming bloody murder.

Whether you have "No Trespassing" signs or not - you're trespassing if you're uninvited on private property. Especially if you're at the back door of a rural property at nightfall.


Like the OP, I live in a rural area. Our house sits back 400' from the road and you can't see it from the road. If someone is standing at my backdoor, uninvited, at 9:30 p.m. claiming that they just need to use the phone, they're lying. If someone that is NOT up to no good REALLY needs to find a phone to use, there are plenty of houses sitting on the road where they could go to the FRONT door and KNOCK.

 

[Diggin It]

What's the crime?

Agreed. Where's the beef?

Only threat I see here was from the OP based on little or nothing. 'Close cut' hair and 'all tatted up' could be a homeless veteran.

And no status update after the officer's arrival. What was the outcome?

 

[Diggin It]

That said, 8 minuets is exceptionally fast. Many cities and suburbs aren't that fast. 20-30 minutes is more expected in most rural areas during daytime and evening hours. After midnight can be much longer since they may have to call a Deputy out of bed like we did between 2 and 6 AM.

 

[Ortimber]

Glad the OP and wife are ok. Our response most likely would be very similar. If a person is standing anywhere by my house at 9:30 in the evening, I will consider that a “potential” threat. I have no desire to harm anyone, but being a victim is really the last thing I want to be.

 

[2LaneCruzer]

:devil: Devil's advocate here:

Real crime of the century: A guy walks up to your house and asking to use the phone....and.......??? :confused3:

Your wife screams bloody murder, yells "Get the gun!" and calls the cops. Why?

Do you have "No Trespassing" signs?

You ask him to leave and he does (while you're making (very thinly veiled) threats about shooting him). OK. Done. What's the crime?

So, what was her complaint to the police? What was HER suspicion based on?

What did the police do? Arrest him for existing? Excessive tattoos? Failure to drive a car? Pedestrian-ing without a cell phone?

Sounds like there was only one party (not counting the cops you brought) bringing gun play and threats of violence to the scene and creating a disturbance.

I don't know what the culture is where you live, but someone coming to my back door at night looking like that already has two strikes against him. This was a crime free area until they started building the low rent apartments, but even so, my area is mostly rural, and professionals; and I assume most every home has a gun or two handy. No one like that exists here, except maybe the tree trimmers with the prison tats. He would stand out like a turd in a punch bowl. Looks can be deceiving, but usually are not.

 

[widefat]

I believe it was General Mattis that said - "Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.’

 

[CobyRupert]

I think you need to re-read the OP's initial post....

The guy didn't just "walk up to the house" - he was at the back door, not the front door.

The guy didn't "ask to use the phone" - from the OP's description, it sounds like he was at the back door and didn't knock and only came up with the phone excuse when the wife started screaming bloody murder.

Whether you have "No Trespassing" signs or not - you're trespassing if you're uninvited on private property. Especially if you're at the back door of a rural property at nightfall.


Like the OP, I live in a rural area. Our house sits back 400' from the road and you can't see it from the road. If someone is standing at my backdoor, uninvited, at 9:30 p.m. claiming that they just need to use the phone, they're lying. If someone that is NOT up to no good REALLY needs to find a phone to use, there are plenty of houses sitting on the road where they could go to the FRONT door and KNOCK.

Ok, maybe some valid points, we don't know.

Some (many) "front doors" are just ornamental, don't even have sidewalks to them and are not the primary door. We don't know.

We don't know if he was standing there observing or just hadn't knocked yet.

Not sure about Indiana, but in most states your not trespassing unless someone has asked you to leave, either verbally or by signage. You're not trespassing just because you haven't been invited.

I get it. Reality is that people are going to react to a tattooed man differently than a woman with a young child. Is that prejudicial? Yes, but that's reality.

It be interesting to know why was he there and outcome with police.

 

[2LaneCruzer]

It's been maybe 30 years, but I did have a lady at my front door ask to use the phone. Her car had quit, and she needed help. I made her stand outside, while I retrieved the cordless from the kitchen. Today, anyone asking to use the phone is suspicious, particularly when virtually everyone today has a cell phone. Even I have a flip phone that I take with me when I'm on the road.