Foe those that don't know (or know exactly what happened), William, my mom and I were victims of an armed robbery at home on Saturday 5 December at 11:45am.
This is how it happened:
I was visiting my mom in her flat (William was on his computer in the study), and I did left the front door open and the Trellidor unlocked in the main house. You'd think you'd be safe during broad daylight on a Saturday but that was not the case. Everything was shut and locked in my mom’s flat because I had seen what looked like the Jehovah’s Witness people walking down the road so we wanted to pretend we weren’t home and avoid that conversation. I was sitting at her kitchenette, with a view out the kitchen window when I saw a white floppy hat go passed. Knowing we weren’t expecting anyone, I said to my mom “Someone’s here” then went to look out her lounge window for a better view. That’s when I saw the first guy with the gun (a 9mm pistol we later found out). He was standing on the paving between the flat and the house looking around. Time stood still and it actually felt like I was in a vacuum. My first instinct was to shout so I screamed “What are you doing here?! Go away” He looked right at me and then I realized we were in trouble. Not knowing what his intentions were I thought he was just there to kill us. My mom and I ran to her bedroom where the alarm keypad and panic button were and we thought we’d hide there until the armed response came. There was no key in the door lock so we stood with our backs to the door to keep it closed. I pressed every single key on the keypad and nothing happened. No sound or alarm. Nothing. I can't explain the feeling of isolation experienced knowing you have one or more armed intruders on your property and there's NO ONE to help you. We had changed security companies on the Thursday before the incident so at the time we thought the link up between the house and the control room had not been done properly. Panicking I took my three week old engagement ring off and put it in my jeans pocket. My mom started screaming for help hoping the neighbors would hear and raise the alarm.
We felt the pushing against the door (later discovered that the smallest criminal had climbed through the doggy door in the sliding door to get into the flat who then opened up for the other), but the criminals never spoke so we didn’t know if it was perhaps William or the security company trying to get in. After asking “Who’s there” and not getting an answer we knew to expect the worst. They eventually kicked the door with such force that my mom was pushed into the wall and I went flying across the room. Two armed men were in the bedroom with us and told us to take off our jewelry, and we must give them our watches and cellphones. My mom’s Michel Herbelin watch and her Nomination bracelet were taken, two very sentimental pieces that can't really be replaced when/if the insurance company pays out. One of the criminals patted down my jeans pockets but thankfully didn’t find the ring.
They took my mom’s TV, handbag with everything in it and marched us across to the main house. Their getaway car was a white Audi A4, reverse parked, engine running and doors open. William, hearing my mom screaming earlier, ran out the study and down the passage only to be confronted with a gun to the head and was told to lie down on the passage floor. The criminal with William opened the gate using our remote which was by the front door to allow the getaway car to get in. William wasn’t moving when I saw him so didn’t know if he’d been hurt. The ringleader told us to lie down on the passage floor next to William. Once down on the floor I grabbed his hand and asked if he was OK. He said he was and that we should just do as the criminals say. Midget and Didget (who never barked once) lay on top of my mom and William. The three criminals ransacked the house, asked if William’s car had a tracker so he said yes. We later found they had prepped the car to go - the garage door was open, the key was in the ignition and the seat was pushed all the way back. They took alcohol, my personal laptop, William’s work laptop, my camera and video camera, all my jewelry, three watches of William’s, his clothes, the lounge TV, my hairdryer, the kettle, George Foreman Grill, the tablet and some other stuff. They kept telling us to look down and not at them. Towards the end, the criminals had the audacity to apologize to us, saying "We're sorry about this" or "We're sorry hey". We lay in the passage for approximately 20 minutes before they moved us to the main bedroom (the only room in the house with a key in the lock) and told us to lie down on the floor. One locked the bedroom door from the inside (it wasn’t locking from the passage side) and escaped through the bathroom window. The other two had already gone out the front door and were waiting in the car. The car pulled off (quietly, no urgency) so we waited a minute or two then climbed out the bedroom window. Luckily we don’t have burglar bars else we would not have been able to get out. William ran through the front door and pressed the panic button (which worked) and our armed response company arrived on scene a few minutes thereafter.
The aftermath consisted of giving our statements to the police, cancelling bank cards and cellphone accounts with the service providers and contacting a locksmith to open our bedroom door as the thieves had taken the key with them. William's iPhone was thrown out the car window a few blocks away (iPhones are very easily tracked and the thieves must have known this) but unfortunately nothing else.
We are so thankful to everybody that stopped by after hearing the news, family, friends, our local CPF patrollers, neighbours and so many more. Your offers of a bed for the night, to cook us dinner, draw cash, etc really resonated within our hearts and we are so grateful to have such fantastic people like you in our lives.
We are going for counselling and heal a bit more each day. People ask if it feels like we're reliving the experience when we tell the story but I personally don't. It's more draining than anything because I get so invested in telling it, so I typed out a version of the events and emailed it to some people when I was just too exhausted to tell it again.
Thanks for all the calls, emails, WhatsApps and Facebook messages that we have received since the incident - we appreciate them all.
Stay safe everyone, those thieves did their Christmas shopping in our house and crime only seems to be getting worse in the lead up to Christmas Day.
Simone
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