James Bay Home Burglaries

I live in the James Bay community on Oswego Street just off of Dallas Road with my better half and our close friend and roommate. We have been broken into twice in the past four weeks and it should be noted that on both of these occasions we have been home and sleeping.

The community should be aware that these burglars do not seem to be afraid of lights being on, people home sleeping, or music playing on the stereo for that matter. I'll paint you a picture of what happened in both instances.

The first burglary occurred on May 23 at approximately 3:00am. Someone or someone's came through our dining room window with the help of a screw driver while my fiancé and myself, and our roommate and her boyfriend were in our respective bedrooms (not quite sleeping). The kitchen light was on and there was music playing from an iPod on the living room stereo. These people crawled through the dining room window and withdrew a couple knives from the knife block and proceeded to rob us of laptops, backpacks, and other miscellaneous electronics all while we were in our bedrooms (not quite sleeping). We all had thought we heard some noise but chalked it up to each other in our separate rooms. Shortly after that the music playing from an iPod on the living room stereo stopped and we thought it had ended or died due to a dead battery. We were not really concerned. Our roommate got up shortly after the music died to get a glass of water and noticed that the dining room window was wide open and all of her school equipment was missing along with the iPod that was once plugged in to the living room stereo not 12' from our bedroom doors. This is when we realized we had been burglarized. The police were called and a statement was made. The burglars made off with a number of items that they could fit in the backpacks that were stolen from our house. We found some miscellaneous belongings scattered around the neighbourhood, though nothing of major value. The locks were changed due to keys being stolen and we went on our way trying to gain back our sense of security.

June 27 2:30am; home in bed and sound asleep. My fiancé wakes up in the back (detached) room after falling asleep watching TV to find the exterior door wide open on both the detached Rec Room and back door to our house. We have been burglarized again!! We have not had the chance to submit our claims for the first lot of stolen items, but what had been replaced (laptops and such) were stolen again. I might also add that since the last burglary we have been leaving the majority of our lights on. It needs to be stressed that these burglars were in our house again while we were sound asleep and took the time to gingerly and quietly unplug a 44" television and walk it down our driveway and down the street or in a waiting vehicle. Again the police were notified and we were told to better secure our house and again we have changed all of the locks.

This is absurd! It's one thing to come home to a burglarized home, but to know that someone has been in your house twice while you slept and (probably looked over us) is completely unacceptable.

The "what if's" start to play out in your mind...what if someone woke up, what if someone gets hurt, what if, what if....

We have no doubt that they will be back because they haven't quite stolen everything; the TV stand and kitchen sink are still in place and although we have taken precautions again to better secure our home and ourselves we as a community need to keep our eyes and ears open for any suspicious activity that happens at any time of day/night and even more so when it is dark out. Our peace of mind may be gone for the time being but if we can all watch out for our neighbours it will only make for a better community.

As for the police in this matter, once they are back from break and or vacation they will be following up on the leads they have from the prints left on some personables and the phone calls placed from our cellular phones. We hope that this will lead them to the culprits that stole our peace of mind.

Everything is replaceable unless it's a life.

I hope the James Bay community can learn a lesson from our story and don't take for granted your neighbours as someone is obviously watching.