PELHAM, NEW HAMPSHIRE — Having good neighbors you can depend on is a priceless gift. Fortunately for this homeowner, when things got dangerous, her neighbor was ready to help. It all started when the homeowner came home and found a strange car in her driveway.
The homeowner said that when she arrived home Wednesday afternoon she saw a car that was not familiar parked in her driveway with the engine running. She then went to her neighbor’s house and stayed there while he checked on her home.
Via The Washington Times
Upon entering the house, the neighbor encountered an intruder in the house and proceeded to show his firearm. He then helped detain him at gunpoint in the driveway until officials arrived.
“He held the burglar at bay until we could arrive,” said Pelham Police Sgt. Matt Keenliside. “So he didn’t do anything wrong there, he’s OK.”
The Breakdown:
A woman returns to her home and finds a car in her driveway that she does not recognize. She notices the engine is still on and the car is running. Her spidey senses are tingling, she can tell something isn’t right.
She heads over to her neighbors house and tells him about what is going on. The neighbor asks her to stay in his house while he goes and investigates. The neighbor walks into the house, takes a look around, and stumbles across a robber. The robber had some things in his possession that didn’t belong to him.
The neighbor draws his firearm and tells the robber to chill. Thankfully, the robber listens and doesn’t want to play stupid games. The neighbor detains the robber until police get there. Since the robber was essentially caught red handed, the police haul him off to jail.
The Bad
The truly bad thing here is that the robber was caught stealing, among other things, children’s piggy banks. You have to be a real special kind of person to steal little kids piggy bank money. We’ve all had them growing up, we know how long it takes for any kind of meaningful kid money to accumulate in those things. Among everything that happened, the robber should be most ashamed about this.
The only thing we can maybe fault the homeowner and neighbor for is that they didn’t call the police and let them investigate. Sure, the neighbor was being a good guy and checking out the situation. Perhaps the better call would have been to call the police and wait by the car to see if anyone comes back to it.
The Good
It may sound silly, but the homeowner displayed some good situational awareness. Not only seeing a strange car in the driveway, but recognize that it was still running was a good observation. That observation led her to feel that something was all wrong about the situation.
Another good move was that she went to a safe place to get help. She didn’t try and investigate the situation herself. Instead she turned to her friendly neighbor for shelter while they contacted police.
Also, good on the neighbor for checking things out and also catching the bad guy. Drawing his weapon on the robber was enough threat to get him to give up. Instead of trying to play super hero, the neighbor simply waited until police arrived to take over.
The police said everything was done well, and since no shots were fired there will be no investigation related to the firearm. Good job neighbor!
