Yeah, Rawkus, now I see. We had a similar situation on one street I lived on in the U.S. There was a public park at one end, and an "entertainment center" at the other, where our residential street intersected a commercial street. There were terrible problems with noise, bottles and trash thrown in our yards, cars vandalized and burglarized, etc. We took several steps to deal with it. A group of the men from our street went to the park and demanded ID of the young people gathered there: they protested mightily, but relented when confronted with a superior force. This "harassment" kept up from night to night until the young people decided we were all crazy, and found other places to hang out. In addition, we got permission of the city to close the street, and walled off our street where it entered the commercial street, leaving us living on a "dead end" street. It was all quiet, after that. That "foot traffic" through your neighborhood is enough to account for everything.
@Rawkus, its funny that i live less than 100meters from you and still have no idea who you are, and i never knew that all these things happened on our quiet little street called cielo! I am a Heavy Sleeper, don,t run in the park & my Apt faces the street so things that occur around the park are something i am unaware of. A problem my street faces is indeed a lot of foot traffic due to the proximity to the entrance of the Hotel Zone & the both collective taxi spots located on each side, one on Bonampak (to Z.H.) & the other in Tulum (To Airport). I honestly suspect that the construction workers (Maybe not all of them) are responsible for 80% of all thefts, they have the tools, opportunity since they sometimes live on site & can keep tabs on your property & learn your schedule.
Epic: If you are up at 6am, you will see me walking dogs Most of it is in the park, not the parking in the front. Since they started the constructions, it has gotten worse. Not necessarily blaming the workers(they even helped us chase down 2 thieves), but Im sure a lot of the break ins are due to these guys. Its never "smash and grab" - its always "neatly" done, with tools. My ground floor neighbors flat has been hit twice. Laptop, jewelery etc. Worst? She had her underwear(!!) stolen right in front of her eyes.. Two guys reached inside through the safety bars and took them. This was before we blocked off the access to the back... Stuff happens, believe me. Late 2008 I witnessed one of the most daring attempts EVER: Two young guys climbed up the side of the pink/peach colored apartment building opposite ours. They used the window-type AC`s as steps and reached the 3rd floor, pushed in the mosquito-screen and entered the flat... I witnessed it all and was putting my runners on... Just 2 mins later I heard a man screaming, angrily. One of the guys ran out through the same window and started to climb down. The other one was pushed out through the same window by the man who lives in the flat A hard thump on the ground. I ran out and they started to run away through the park, but Im guessing the second guy was hurt from the fall, and it was easy to catch him and knock him over. A neighbor from across the park called the cops, and bot of us held the "kid" down until they arrived. They showed little mercy and started punching and kicking him until handcuffing and throwing him in the back of the car. The other guy got away... This all happened in the middle of the day, at noon!!
I have to agree a bit with everyone, here. As Rivergirl says, there's a lot of crime here in Cancun. My house has been broken into twice (2 different houses in the same neighborhood), a neighbor was raped at home during the day (on the other side of the wall where my bed was), and I just got some copper wires stolen. My boyfriend was mugged at knifepoint once, and my brother-in-law three times. Definitely more crime than I ever saw in Richmond, Virginia, where I grew up. I'd never even come close to being a crime victim until I moved here 5 years ago, and even then, all the breakins happened in the past 2 years (when I moved into a new neighborhood). I also think that it's very unlikely you'll be raped, murdered, or kidnapped unless you're involved in something higher up (every incident here that I've heard of, such was the case). What DOES piss me off is that the media plays it up as dangerous for tourists!! I may feel worried about finding my belongings strewn about when I get home, but I never feel as safe anywhere as I do in the Hotel Zone. You'd have to be pretty stupid (or drunk) for something bad to happen to you there. To sum up: Scared of robbers and those damn dogs in my neighborhood, plus the lying American media. Nothing else.
I think this has been the key for us. We live in a zone which I would presume based on previous experience to be a prime 'target' area; we straddle the line between the tourist haven (hotels and 5th) and the rest of the standard city. Almost everyone who lives in this area is a foreigner and we all have plenty of electronics and similar for the taking. But we haven't had one incidence and none of our close neighbors has either. That is in stark contrast to other friends I have in the city (mostly in similar zones), who've suffered all kinds of unfortunate encounters, namely, break-ins and theft. The only big difference, is that we live on a 1-way street that only exists for a single block, and where the intersecting [1-way] streets loop around. As a result, we have very light vehicle traffic and even less foot traffic. We are close to everything and on the way to nothing. Seems like the perfect stymie to general street crime. *Knocks on a whole lot of wood* Burglary and general break-ins are the only kind of crime that has ever worried me here, and admittedly, there are some nights where I don't sleep well when the rare, suspicious vagabond is out and around. As far as violent crime goes, my stature might be a significant buffer to most would-be criminals (although I'm a big teddy bear.) I always make my presence known and have never had anyone remotely approach me in a threatening manner. That said, Laura has been bothered occasionally by someone following her or harassing her. Whenever this occurs, she'll just give me a call and I'm there in a snap and the people in question either vanish or once, received a stern warning from myself. That doesn't happen too often anymore, however, be it by luck, coincidence, or whatever.
@Rawkus: Way too early for me!! I am curious since all these i got robbed once & my neighbor got mugged with a weapon of some sort stories being posted. Does anybody have something they can use for self defense or protection? I have a Pepper Spray, a Baseball Bat (Gift but handy), Taser & a couple of years of Martial Arts Training (am quite rusty but still remember how to fight dirty).
I know in certain areas of town the thieves wouldn't dare reach their arm through someones windows bars, for fear of a machete taking it off. As much as I hate hearing barking dogs all the time, I'll admit they do a good job of keeping the casual thieves away from your house. Pepper spray isn't a bad idea, but unless you have it in your hand ready to go at all times, it probably won't do you too much good. Likewise a taser (unless its the pistol sort that fire at distance) is even more unlikely to help since it requires good contact with the person, and a well charged battery. Those tacky personal body alarms are probably not a bad idea for the ladies who are out and about alone, even if nobody responds just the sounds will make most attackers realize that they are potentially attracting too much attention. The only instance that I've had out and about was shortly after I arrived here walking in the Crucero area around dusk... a guy walked up to me and showed me a little pistol (25cal or something) at the time I thought he was trying to sell it and just told him "no gracias" and kept walking... I've since realized he was probably trying to rob me but I just wasn't interested. :icon_razz: LOL Other than that I joined the "I was robbed" club last year when someone (I assume with a fishing pole or something) fished about $2,000usd worth of jewelry and things off of my counter though the kitchen window. Since then, I've moved anything of value to the other side of the room, so unless they have a 12 foot pole its out of reach, I also don't leave things really visible anymore. All in all, I figure he was just an opportunistic thief who got really lucky and of' course its the sort of thing that can happen anywhere. I've had my house burglarized and my car broken into in the States, so here is no different. I'm sorry to hear the stories about rapes and robberies that have hit so close to home for some of you, but unless you're going to lock yourselves in a panic room forever all you can do is be vigilant and keep yourselves out of those situations as best you can.
Gringation wrote: Definitely concur with that, plus tourists are at very little risk when doing the usual tourist things, and staying in the usual tourist places, in Quintana Roo. To raise the risk level to what us "locals" are talking about, you'd have to live in the local parts of town, or go off on your own a lot, outside the tourist areas: even then, the chances of something happening would be low- but would be somewhat increased. For those who like to keep things nice and safe, and still let your hair down, you can't beat the hotel zone.
The only place we have EVER had anything stolen from our car was when we were parked at Costco, waiting out Dean.
