Lock all doors and windows at night and before leaving your home.
Leave your outside lights or porch lights on at night.
Photograph all of your valuables and keep track of serial numbers.
Don’t leave valuables in plain sight.
Consider who has access to your house. Are any of them using drugs?
If you answer the door and the person seems suspicious, take note of what they look like. Get a good look at their car and write down the license plate number if you can.
If you see someone at a neighbor’s house that you don’t recognize and your neighbor isn’t home, call 911. Police often catch burglars while they’re still in the house or just as they’re leaving.
Vancouver police say a greater percentage of drug-addicted young adults are responsible for the area’s property crimes, including burglaries, commercial robberies, vehicle prowls and mail and auto thefts. Drug addicts looking to get a hit will do whatever they must to afford their habits.
“I’m very often surprised at how naïve people are about this connection between drug addiction and theft,” said Cmdr. Mike Cooke, with the Clark-Vancouver Regional Drug Task Force.