SURVIVING DTLA - HOW TO AVOID CRIME

how to avoid becoming a victim of crime

You probably heard on the news by now that crime is on the uptake in downtown Los Angeles or worse maybe you’ve become a victim of crime yourself.

While it’s true there are protection services like local police, private security guards and BID patrols we’re paying to keep us safe, crime can strike at any time, at any place. Here’s a list of ways to help you avoid becoming a victim of crime in Downtown LA – like a boss!

Out of Sight Out of Mind Believe it or not, most criminals are pretty narrowminded and many times spontaneous. Their impulsive actions can lead to purse grabs, and stolen cell phones mainly just because they’ve spotted it out and made up their minds in an instant that moment was the perfect time to commit a crime and make you a victim.

Instead of carrying your cell phone or purse out in the open, why not use ear phones and keep your phone in your pocket and use a backpack so that your belongings aren’t so easily snatched?

like a boss!

Protect Your Storefront with a Roll-Up Gate So back in the days when the Historic Core BID was Bringing Back Broadway one of the prerequisites was new leasees had to purchase a steel rollup grid gate. Guess the point was to allow light to shine through the windows to lighten up the damp dark Broadway corridor. Well, the riots proved that dinky steel fences would eventually succumb to an angry mob. Filmed at eleven.

Yet, for the average lone criminal grid gates and all roll-ups prove to be quite a deterrent. These roll-ups also work well with those determined criminals who spend weeks casing your place.

Unfortunately, these rollup gates are costly, ranging anywhere from $1000-$25,000. Be sure you advocate your property owners install these roll-ups gates immediately to not succumb to this current trend of smash and grab robberies. With the high cost most are charging for rent, they should be able to fork it.

In the meantime, we recommend curtains or papercovered windows to keep the spontaneous lookie-loo criminals from getting overly excited.

Lock Your Doors We’d like to take the time to bring up that hostage situation that happened a few months back. The poor girl was just in the house with the cat when a crazy jumped in and took her hostage at gun point.

Believe it or not, this happens more often than we’d like to mention in Downtown LA. way inside of apartment buildings all day and all night only to make surveillance video cameos for all of us to see. All this celebrity fame before either getting away, getting arrested, or getting shot dead by SWAT. Either way, it never ends well. And hostage victims stay traumatized for decades.

Although our first recommendation would be to barricade the door with a couple of steel brackets and a two-by-four (your landlord is gonna love that), you may search the internet for several impenetrable locks that don’t damage the door frame.

In the meantime, keep your doors locked! You may even purchase one of those automatic locking doorknobs. Another tip is to make sure your lobby doors close and lock behind you.