Olivia Alsept-Ellis |
Senior Ben Mesches returned to his off-campus rental home after spending the holidays with family, only to discover a scene of chaos. The TV was missing, his guitars were taken from his room and there was broken glass on the floor from where burglars had entered the home. During the same Christmas week, another empty off-campus house, home to junior Emily Bliven, also discovered a burglary. Now, a month later, the students speak about living in their once-ransacked homes. Although they said the ordeal has been frustrating and scary at times, the students said it could also be considered a learning and growing experience.
According to the Portland Police Bureau’s Crime Statistics, during the week of Dec. 22, the University Park neighborhood experienced a spike in reported crime, which includes burglary, larceny, theft from a vehicle and theft of a vehicle. These houses were just two victims out of 12 combined crimes in these categories. Currently, the crimes are under investigation by Portland Police, but both houses report that they have not been updated about any leads.
Insult to Injury
“Our house is completely ransacked,” Mesches’ texted his housemates: seniors Devin Helmgren, Jackie Ackerson, Sam Schelfhout, Rachel Van Nes and recent graduate Matt Tominaga.
“That (text message) ground my whole evening to a halt,” Helmgren said. “One second, you’re getting ready for bed. And the next second, you’re thinking, ‘OK, what do I do now?’”
Mesches said that when he first came home, he tried to rationalize why the TV was missing until he finally realized that it had been stolen.
He continued to update his housemates on the extent of the loss as he discovered it, some items not being as obviously missing as the TV.
“I thought, ‘oh well that all sucks for them,’ but I didn’t leave anything valuable at home,” Van Nes said. “And then Ben called me and said, ‘Rachel, your car is stolen.’ Aww man, I thought I had gotten off the hook.”
When the housemates returned home, they found their rooms in a state of disarray.
“All of the bedrooms had been turned over. Things on the shelves were on the floors. Things in the desk – floor,” Helmgren said.
Ackerson’s bedroom experienced a strange and unknown damage. Her bed sheets had tears and “strange marks.”
“I wasn’t going to sleep with those sheets,” Ackerson said. “I just bought new sheets.”
Once they were back, Mesches said they all decided to sleep in the living room together for protection – or, at least, for the feeling of protection.
“We were all on edge and spooked and hadn’t seen each other in a while,” Helmgren said. “But at some point that night, they came back.”
As the house slept together in the living room, metaphorical lightning struck again: Mesches’ car was stolen as it sat in the driveway. He said that it was likely the same burglars who broke into the house because he realized they had stolen his keys. The housemates said that it was disturbing to know that the burglars had the audacity to return while they were all inside.
“I called the police and reported my car missing, but they said, ‘Your car wasn’t stolen, it was impounded,’” Mesches said. “I said, ‘No, I think it was both. I think it was both stolen and then impounded’...We found out it was impounded in front of this apartment over on Lombard.”
“And they took all the spoons”
While Mesches’ car is back in his possession – the only damaged sustained was a lone cigarette burn within the few hours it was stolen – no other items have been recovered.
Currently, the housemates can attribute a wild assortment of missing items to the winter break burglary: two Xboxes, a Wii, N64 controllers and games, 10 different instruments, amplifiers, a desktop computer, a TV, a passport, credit cards, a student ID, a bike, jewelry, perfume, backpacks, pens and pencils, journals, a graphing calculator, clothing and shoes. The burglars even smashed the piggy banks and took the contents, leaving shards scattered across the floor.
The other burglarized household went through the same experience. Junior Emily Bliven said that her house was aware of the burglary just after Christmas.
“I couldn’t come home immediately so until I could see it, I had all these weird dreams about the stuff they could have taken,” Bliven said.
The back door window had been smashed. Items now missing are the vacuum cleaner, TV, a passport, a laptop, a guitar, jewelry, backpacks, a toolbox, a lamp and food items.
However, many of the items the burglars took have left the housemates scratching their heads.
“They took all the coffee in the house,” Bliven said. “We had just a bunch of half-used coffee things that they took.”
Bliven expressed some confusion due to the fact that other, perhaps more valuable items in the house, were passed over for the coffee bags. The other house too had an assortment of odd items stolen.
“The thing that really gets me is that some of the stuff they stole just doesn’t make sense. They took my almond milk,” Ackerson said. “They left the VCR but they took the cord that connects the VCR to the TV. Who does that?”
“And they took all the spoons,” Van Nes added.
Houses at Risk for Burglary
-House visibly appears unoccupied (i.e. accumulating newspapers or mail) -High level of isolation from other houses or natural coverage (such as trees or shrubs) -Major thoroughfares make the house easily accessible -Security is low – either no alarm systems, weak entry points or unlocked doors *Information from the Office of Neighborhood Involvement
What Hurts the Most
However, students discovered that much of the stolen property was high in sentimental value – the measure of the offense cutting even deeper.
“I had a tin Barbie lunchbox with all of my little treasures from Europe. So it had a bunch of different coins and playing cards and salt from Austria,” Bliven said. “I don’t know what they’re going to do with that. Probably just throw it away.”
Ackerson said she is hurt most by her bike being stolen.
“To be honest, it was a really (broken) bike,” Ackerson said. “But that was the last thing my grandfather had given me. So, for all that I complain about it, it was really special.”
Both households said they felt targeted in some way by this attack.
“(The burglars) obviously had been watching us, because normally we have five cars here and they had all disappeared over winter break,” Bliven said. “And they must have been watching for when my housemate went home for Christmas.”
The other house said what hurt the most for them was that they traced credit card purchases of the stolen card in order to know the day of their burglary: it was on Christmas Eve.
“If they knew to come at that time, they had to have known we were college students,” Van Nes said. “Because we were only gone for a week.”
Although Director of Public Safety Gerald Gregg is aware of the crimes, they technically fall outside of Public Safety’s jurisdiction. Gregg also said that assuming that the houses were targeted is a loaded statement.
“I don’t believe anyone is necessarily targeting students,” Gregg said. “However, it seems somebody went through the North Portland neighborhood and committed property crime.”
Staying Safe, but Still Spooked
The students are still living in the homes that were broken into, with new locks and glass windows fixed. However, they noted that alarm systems won’t necessarily make them feel much safer.
“It makes me feel vulnerable, even now,” Bliven said. “If somebody got in here again, they could take everything again.”
Bumps in the night aren’t met with ignorance but fear.
“Now I’m really paranoid about them coming back. I watch any new cars outside of our house,” Helmgren said. “And if I hear a noise when I think no one else is home, it freaks me out.”
The students have shaped their behavior to uphold more alert house practices.
“We always set the (house) alarm when we leave and we know now that we can talk to our neighbors before we leave,” Ackerson said. “Tell them, ‘I’m going to be gone, so if you see any activity, it’s not me.’”
Gregg agreed that students can take precautions to ward off burglars in the future.
“It never hurts to leave some porch lights on,” he said. “Let neighbors, who aren’t leaving, help keep an eye on things. That said, you can do everything right and somebody may think, ‘Hey that house looks empty, I’m gonna go see what I can find.’”
The students, however, have dealt with the emotional impact of the theft in their own ways. Ackerson, Van Nes, Mesches and Helmgren all run UP’s improv team, The Bluffoons. They’ve sourced hilarity as a primary method of coping.
“I’m really thankful that we’re all comedians,” Helmgren said. “That’s how we’ve handled this. By laughing at it. Like, they took all the spoons! That’s pretty funny.”
Bliven said materialism has little power over her.
“They’re thieves and they can only have power over you if you let them,” Bliven said. “If you think about the things that have been taken from you as things you didn’t really own in the first place, then it doesn’t seem all that bad.”
Preventative Measures
-Never leave keys outside (under a potted plant or doormat) -Install a variety of security devices, such as a basic alarm or a motion-sensing outdoor light -Block outside visibility to items like TVs, laptops, or other electronics -For short term, consider leaving a TV on to create the appearance of occupancy -For long term, ask neighbors to pick up mail or set lights on timers *Information from the Office of Neighborhood Involvement
