A Fair Warning: Avoid Victimization
Readers should carry away a fair understanding of how crime impacts our society in general, and, more importantly, its devastating (if not fatal) effect on victims and their loved ones. Let’s look at crime this way: there’s a lot of it, and every crime has at least one victim.
What does this mean? Table A.1 shows part of the data published by the U.S. Department of Justice every year in a vast annual study titled “Crime in the United States.” The data is condensed into what is referred to as the “crime clock.”
Table A.1
| Every | Crime |
| 22.2 seconds | One violent crime |
| 30.9 minutes | One murder |
| 5.7 minutes | One forcible rape |
| 1.2 minutes | One robbery |
| 36.6 seconds | One aggravated assault |
| 3.2 seconds | One property crime |
| 14.4 seconds | One burglary |
| 4.8 seconds | One larceny/theft |
| 26.4 seconds | One motor vehicle theft |
Suggestions to discourage, reduce, or prevent crimes
Murder
In a business environment:
1. Comply with robbers demands for money, don’t resist or argue.
2. Report threats of violence in the workforce.
As an individual:
Rape
In a business environment:
1. A female shouldn’t close the business alone at night.
2. A female shouldn’t open a business early in the morning when it’s still dark outside.
3. A female employee shouldn’t leave the business and walk to her car alone after dark; walk in pairs or in a group.
4. If one female must work alone at night, there should be an obvious security presence in the form of CCTV cameras, alarms, and appropriate signage indicating security measures are in place.
As an individual:
1. Avoid walking alone in dark parking areas.
2. Park in busy, heavily trafficked, well-illuminated areas, preferably under light stanchions.
4. Carry car keys in your hand for prompt entry.
5. If you feel threatened while in a parking area, active your auto alarm with your remote.
6. Lock the doors once inside the car.
7. If being persistently followed by another car, drive to a well-illuminated busy business and use your cellphone to call the police. Or drive to a police station.
8. Don’t respond to private or personal classified ads by yourself, especially in remote areas.
9. If at home, ensure your exterior doors are locked, preferably with a deadbolt.
10. If at home, never leave windows or glass sliders fully open at night for ventilation. Locking devises are available to allow partial opening only that are not wide enough for entry by a person. If no lock is available, use a stick or shortened broom handle in the sliding track.
11. If at home, don’t open the door without knowing who is ringing or knocking.
12. Don’t accept single dates with strangers or men you don’t know well, irrespective of how nice or well-groomed he may appear.
13. Be moderate in your alcohol intake while at private parties or clubs.
14. In a hotel, do not open or insert the card key (or any key) to open your door if anyone is walking in the hall close to you. A common crime practice is for a perpetrator to push the guest into her room and then have the privacy to do as he pleases.
15. Do not throw the bolt or swing the privacy latch to prevent the hotel door from fully closing as you go for ice or to visit another room.
Robbery
In a business environment:
1. In a cash business, do not allow the register or terminal to exceed a predetermined amount. Pull out the excess cash and deposit it in drop-safe or other repository designed for that purpose.
2. In the event of a robbery, train employees to promptly comply with the demands.
3. The company safe should be locked at all times.
4. If possible, large sums of money shouldn’t be kept at the business but rather should be deposited at the bank.
5. Armored car service is best for transporting cash to the bank.
6. If daily receipts are hand-carried to the bank, the employee should not follow a scheduled time, or routinely follow the same route.
7. Avoid openly carrying bank or deposit bags. Disguise the container so your intention is not conspicuous (e.g., I once carried $1,000,000 in cash and checks to a bank in a sanitary napkin carton).
As an individual:
1. Do not carry large sums of money as a general rule.
2. Do not “flash” or count money when you leave the bank.
3. Don’t “flash” or count money openly at an amusement park, race track, or in a casino.
4. At night, avoid parking in poorly illuminated areas.
5. As you drive, keep your car’s doors locked.
6. If you have an automatic garage door opener, when you drive into your garage at night, close the garage door before you get out of your car.
7. If approached by a robber, surrender quickly anything he or she demands.
8. As stated before, when staying in a hotel, do not open or insert the card key (or any key) to open your door if anyone is walking in the hall close to you. A common crime practice is for perpetrators to push guests into their rooms and then have the privacy therein to do as they please.
9. In a hotel room, if you receive a call an employee is on their way to deliver something, confirm that call by calling the front desk.
10. Do not throw the bolt or swing the privacy latch to prevent the hotel door from fully closing as you go for ice or to visit another room.
Important tools or weapons of self-defense are the awareness of the potential for crime and the skill of reading body language. Repeat: awareness and reading body language.
Here’s a practical example of reading body language: A person who is considering doing something bad tends to concentrate on the object of his attack—that is, the victim, if the intention is to harm a person, or an object, if the intention is to steal property. In addition to focusing his or her attention, the individual tends to exhibit some nervousness and project what I have identified as an “aura of guilt” before, during, and subsequent to the crime. Have you ever seen a person “look” guilty when questioned about something he or she shouldn’t have done? Have you ever seen a person jump or jerk when you come upon him or her and he or she appears nervous or sheepish and you wondered why? Have you ever seen a person stutter or stammer when not telling the truth? Those are physical manifestations of the sense of guilt—the aura of guilt. A seasoned store detective can tell you his or her experience when he or she has come around a corner and are unexpectedly face to face with a person who has just stolen an item; that eye-to-eye contact with the guilty party evokes an almost visible admission of guilt.
A quick glance at people around you typically reveals everyone is focused on any number of other things, not you. Put another way: look for people looking at you. Practice looking for this and adopt this as your own safety routine. If you feel the slightest bit uneasy because of anyone’s presence, break the momentum of the event by reversing your direction or walk toward and close to anyone else in the area until your sense of concern has passed or the person you were wary of is gone. Don’t end up a victim. Don’t end up in court. Better safe than sorry.
Good luck. Be alert. Be wary. Be safe. Stay safe.