Break In

My office got broken into last night. Scary! I got to work this morning at 8 and after unlocking our menagerie of doors to get to the alarm to turn it off, and to get to the time clock to punch my “in” time, I noticed that the back office was all messed up. There were binders and fedex envelopes all over the desk and floor, the phone was off the hook, and everything on the desk was turned over. Then I noticed that the screen on the window above the desk was cut out and another door in our office was open. Then I noticed some blood smeared on the doorframe of another office and pretty much freaked out. I didn’t take a minute to realize that the window itself was shut and locked and that the alarm was set when I got to work, and that the front door was locked—all I could think about was the possibility that there was some guy bleeding in our office somewhere. But after a few seconds, I realized how silly that was, and noticed a note on my desk with the Cottonwood Heights Police Department business card next to it. Obviously they had been here and secured the building during the night. The note was from my boss’s wife who came when the police got notice that our alarm had been set off. She thought they had somehow forced the window open in the back office, unlocked the room’s door from the inside, and then set off the motion detector alarm and ran out thefront door. But here’s the best part:

I opened the window yesterday to let in a breeze since 67 degree weather feels hot compared to the freezing temperatures we’re supposed to have in winter.

I forgot to close it.

Lucky me. But still, I DID do everything else I was supposed to do according to our security policy. I shut and locked all the doors and secured my files and my desk, I set the alarm and locked the front door. And not to mention—it’s not just MY responsibility to secure the entire building—there ARE other people in the office too. But I still feel bad. Maybe they would have still tried to break in even if the window was shut, and maybe we would have had broken glass. That’s what I’ll tell myself so I don’t die of guilt.

My boss’s wife told me that the blood was from one of the police dogs who cut himself on something during the search. That’s sort of a relief—although I feel really bad that a hero dog got hurt instead of a criminal. She also said they did a search of the building and couldn’t find anything missing. Weird; we have a ton of stuff they could have grabbed on the way out; I guess they were put off by the alarm going off.

The other REALLY creepy thing is that yesterday afternoon I was alone in the office from like 3:30 till 5:30 and during that time some random guy came in from walking around outside and said something like, “I’m waiting at the title company right over there. Do you have a restroom I could use?” Um… no? But really, I like being a nice person, so while my brain was deciding whether or not to say no, my body was already pointing down the hall and my mouth was already saying, “Uh, sure, straight back.” Usually we don’t get anyone in our office at all except scheduled appointments and solicitors, so random people is not a common occurrence. But when our clients use the restroom, they usually just go right back, they look at the door the whole time. I was kind of wary of this guy anyways, since I was alone in the office, and I noticed that he looked into both offices as he went back. Creepazoid. He was SUPER fast—not that I know for sure how long it takes a man to pee, but still. At least he washed his hands. Then he left, leaving a black boot print on our new rug. Jerk.

So not thinking about it anymore after he was gone, I excitedly got ready to go pick up my Cricut after work! I guess I was a little too excited since I forgot to shut the window. As I was getting on the freeway after work, I wondered if I’d shut it and wondered if I should go back just in case. Hm, no.

Oh well. Nothing was stolen, and now more people in the office will be a little more aware and not just leave it all up to me all the time. Sucks that one of the ONLY days I’m not really adamant about our security policy is the day I’m excited off my rocker to leave work.

Now I’m just waiting for my boss to get out of an appointment so he can chastise me and have us all review the security policy together. Ugh.