South San Francisco, CA June 17, 2016 Corporal Jason Pfarr, SSFPD contributed to this article
PREFACE: Recently a neighbor was the victim of strong arm robbery after returning home; the suspect had followed her into her garage. An online conversation ensued with a few neighbors about the safest way to avoid this situation with one possible suggestion of closing the garage doors prior to getting out of your car.
Another neighbor acknowledged with a differing thought “I think this may be a good approach, except that you could end up shutting yourself into the garage with the robber if he sneaked in or broke in before you closed it up. Someone should probably ask a law enforcement agency to advise on which approach is safer.”
To that end we contacted Corporal Jason Pfarr for his take on this. He agreed neighbors need to be watchful and stated if someone were to follow you unaware and inadvertently became locked in your garage with you, you could be ‘trapped inside or could prevent someone from hearing you yell for help.’ Because another neighbor had a similar situation 8 years ago this seems worthy of follow up. While rare, we need to be prepared and aware of our surroundings. The safety tips below, provided by Corporal Pfarr, are good reminders for us all.
