So, I spent 4 days in Colorado Springs with my wife as a "getaway", and got a whole bunch of things off my bucket list...
Ride the Royal Gorge Train - check
Visit the USAF Academy - check
See the USAF Academy Chapel (it was closed for renovation )
Have a wonderful buffet breakfast at the USAF Academy Hotel - wow, it was sorry - but check
Ride the Cog Rail to Pike's Peak - check
Visit the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo - check
Visit the Garden of the Gods - check, and WOW
And quite a number of other spectacular things, including just "looking around" and seeing the Rockies
HOWEVER, never in my wildest dreams would I have expected to experience my very first (and hopefully only) Home Invasion attempt!
We had just gotten "home" (to our AirB&B home away from home) and were relaxing for a bit before our next adventure.
We were both on the couch watching the weather on TV, when we heard a pounding on the back sliding glass window.
There was a man standing there beating on the glass, trying to open the sliding door, staring right at my wife.
I got up, grabbed my 'tactical flashlight' and ran to the door, yelling at him to go away, and shining the light in his face.
He looked startled, and stepped back a bit, then tried opening the door again.
I yelled again (in my superior 'police presence' voice) for him to back away, and told my wife to call 911.
I began my "identify the suspect" routine, noting white male, about 40-50, 5'9", 180lbs, baggy shorts, oversized tennis shoes, dark blue horizontally striped shirt, baseball cap --- and wasn't sure, but maybe only ONE arm! Wife relayed the description to the police while I kept an eye on him.
He backed away, and headed down an alley. I stepped outside to keep an eye on direction of travel for police, but noted that he stopped at an overflowing dumpster across the alley, and began digging through it, even though it was under a bright street light and made him clearly visible.
Police are still on the way, so I saw my job as keeping an eye on him. I came back into the house to put on shoes (I had been in my bare feet), and went outside to see where he was. I didn't see him, but I did a good job of looking around before I stepped away from the house, and noted there was a little "alcove" to the left of the porch where somebody could hide if they wanted to.
Sure enough, as I stepped around that corner, he was standing there, and I, again, yelled at him to leave, shining the light in his face, and chased him down the alley, where he began digging in the dumpster again.
I went back into the house to check on my wife, and she was very calmly updating the police department on what I was telling her. I stepped outside again, and this time, I saw him walking from the dumpster toward the other end of the alley (to my right) but this time with a baseball bat or club or stick in his hand, swinging it and mumbling something.
Back inside, updated my wife so she could relay information, and she told that dispatch was saying a patrol unit was in my neighborhood. Looking outside, the man had returned to the dumpster.
Sure enough, Police arrived, down at the other end of the alley, so I walked down, my hands in the air away from my body, and identified myself as the complainant. The first cop to approach me thanked me for that, as they thought immediately I might be the suspect. I pointed down the alley to the dumpster, and said "that's him - he's still there, and I think he only has one arm".
They kept an eye on him, but kept talking to me, asking if he did, in fact, attempt to break in, and was I positive that was the same man.
Yes, absolutely, multiple times, he was banging on the back sliding glass door, and yanking on the handle, and, yes, that's absolutely positively the man I saw.
They approached the guy, who was still focused on digging through the dumpster, throwing some stuff up in the air, and stuffing some other things into a black garbage sack. I could see them talking to him, he was gesturing (and this time I could clearly see he had only one arm) and talking to them, but things seemed under control.
After a while, one of the officers came to me and asked if I wanted to press charges. I explained that we were just AirB&B residents, and would be leaving Saturday morning with no plans on coming back. At that point, the officer sadly explained there wasn't much he could do, because the laws had changed, and what used to be "aggravated attempted burglary" no longer was, and drug laws had been so relaxed, and they were seeing TONS of this stuff, but there wasn't anything they could charge him with, and all they could do was encourage him to move to some other place in the city.
The cop seemed clearly frustrated that they were seeing more and more of this, and not only were they not allowed to charge, but even if they did, the guy would get a free pass at bail, and be released to do it all over again. The asked to speak to the owner of the house, so my wife called the B&B owner, and the cops just wanted to make sure that THEY didn't want to press charges, because the guy also appears to have tried to kick open a wooden gate around that "alcove" I mentioned. The owners didn't want to press charges, but they immediately offered to put us in a hotel if we didn't want to stay there. That wasn't a problem, but they refunded us two nights anyway.
Two things...
Ride the Royal Gorge Train - check
Visit the USAF Academy - check
See the USAF Academy Chapel (it was closed for renovation )
Have a wonderful buffet breakfast at the USAF Academy Hotel - wow, it was sorry - but check
Ride the Cog Rail to Pike's Peak - check
Visit the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo - check
Visit the Garden of the Gods - check, and WOW
And quite a number of other spectacular things, including just "looking around" and seeing the Rockies
HOWEVER, never in my wildest dreams would I have expected to experience my very first (and hopefully only) Home Invasion attempt!
We had just gotten "home" (to our AirB&B home away from home) and were relaxing for a bit before our next adventure.
We were both on the couch watching the weather on TV, when we heard a pounding on the back sliding glass window.
There was a man standing there beating on the glass, trying to open the sliding door, staring right at my wife.
I got up, grabbed my 'tactical flashlight' and ran to the door, yelling at him to go away, and shining the light in his face.
He looked startled, and stepped back a bit, then tried opening the door again.
I yelled again (in my superior 'police presence' voice) for him to back away, and told my wife to call 911.
I began my "identify the suspect" routine, noting white male, about 40-50, 5'9", 180lbs, baggy shorts, oversized tennis shoes, dark blue horizontally striped shirt, baseball cap --- and wasn't sure, but maybe only ONE arm! Wife relayed the description to the police while I kept an eye on him.
He backed away, and headed down an alley. I stepped outside to keep an eye on direction of travel for police, but noted that he stopped at an overflowing dumpster across the alley, and began digging through it, even though it was under a bright street light and made him clearly visible.
Police are still on the way, so I saw my job as keeping an eye on him. I came back into the house to put on shoes (I had been in my bare feet), and went outside to see where he was. I didn't see him, but I did a good job of looking around before I stepped away from the house, and noted there was a little "alcove" to the left of the porch where somebody could hide if they wanted to.
Sure enough, as I stepped around that corner, he was standing there, and I, again, yelled at him to leave, shining the light in his face, and chased him down the alley, where he began digging in the dumpster again.
I went back into the house to check on my wife, and she was very calmly updating the police department on what I was telling her. I stepped outside again, and this time, I saw him walking from the dumpster toward the other end of the alley (to my right) but this time with a baseball bat or club or stick in his hand, swinging it and mumbling something.
Back inside, updated my wife so she could relay information, and she told that dispatch was saying a patrol unit was in my neighborhood. Looking outside, the man had returned to the dumpster.
Sure enough, Police arrived, down at the other end of the alley, so I walked down, my hands in the air away from my body, and identified myself as the complainant. The first cop to approach me thanked me for that, as they thought immediately I might be the suspect. I pointed down the alley to the dumpster, and said "that's him - he's still there, and I think he only has one arm".
They kept an eye on him, but kept talking to me, asking if he did, in fact, attempt to break in, and was I positive that was the same man.
Yes, absolutely, multiple times, he was banging on the back sliding glass door, and yanking on the handle, and, yes, that's absolutely positively the man I saw.
They approached the guy, who was still focused on digging through the dumpster, throwing some stuff up in the air, and stuffing some other things into a black garbage sack. I could see them talking to him, he was gesturing (and this time I could clearly see he had only one arm) and talking to them, but things seemed under control.
After a while, one of the officers came to me and asked if I wanted to press charges. I explained that we were just AirB&B residents, and would be leaving Saturday morning with no plans on coming back. At that point, the officer sadly explained there wasn't much he could do, because the laws had changed, and what used to be "aggravated attempted burglary" no longer was, and drug laws had been so relaxed, and they were seeing TONS of this stuff, but there wasn't anything they could charge him with, and all they could do was encourage him to move to some other place in the city.
The cop seemed clearly frustrated that they were seeing more and more of this, and not only were they not allowed to charge, but even if they did, the guy would get a free pass at bail, and be released to do it all over again. The asked to speak to the owner of the house, so my wife called the B&B owner, and the cops just wanted to make sure that THEY didn't want to press charges, because the guy also appears to have tried to kick open a wooden gate around that "alcove" I mentioned. The owners didn't want to press charges, but they immediately offered to put us in a hotel if we didn't want to stay there. That wasn't a problem, but they refunded us two nights anyway.
Two things...
- I never experienced an attempted home invasion - I can add that to my bucket list.
- The frustration of the Colorado Springs Police in how quickly their city is going downhill with regard to crime and criminal justices, and drugs...
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