The purpose of the guide is to alert renters to conditions that enable criminals to prosper within an apartment complex. Being able to recognize these situations allows the renter to proactively avoid or fix them.

From finding an apartment to bolstering your own home, this Guide is intended to empower Atlanta renters so they might avoid becoming victims. When you know what to look for and what to do about it, securing your home environment is easy with a little diligence and forethought. Burglars and other criminals can be dissuaded from invading your space if you make it uninviting by following the advice given in this guide.

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If you or someone you love has been the victim of a violent crime, we understand the pain and psychological damage that can follow. We also understand all of the legal implications and are here to help you- contact us anytime.

PART THREE: Make your existing home SAFER!

In the final segment of our Apartment Safety Guide we will provide some information to make your CURRENT home safer- no matter where you live. In neighborhoods people consider safe, a false sense of security sometimes prevents people from taking easy and smart precautions.

Be Safer Rule # 1 – Do Not Rely Solely on Your Landlord’s Locks to Keep You Safe

You may need to get a new deadbolt lock. Keys that have been returned after rental use may have been duplicated previously and you cannot be sure that management actually changed or rekeyed your locks before you moved in. If you do change the lock, you should make management aware and provide them with a copy of the key in case of emergency.

You should also consider enhancing your window locks – even if you don’t live on the ground floor. Hardware and home improvement stores sell many inexpensive options that could greatly increase the efficiency of the locks that are already present.

Be Safer Rule # 2 – Being Safe Can Be Cheap
In addition to replacing your lock, there are a number of other affordable ways to make your apartment safer for less than $80. Over the course of a 12 month lease that’s only about $7 per month.

• Battery operated burglar alarm – $30-50 – Piercing loud- an alarm immediately takes away the most important factor to an assailant – the element of surprise.
• New Deadbolt Lock – $12-25 – Your own key, for your own safety.
• Pepper Spray – $8-25 – Don’t just have one for your purse. Hammer a nail near the door and hang the pepper spray out of the reach of children. Keeping it near the door will give you easy access to it in the event an intruder is trying to force their way in.
• Police Grade Mini-Flashlight - $20 or less. Use it for getting out of your car or removing something from the trunk of your car. Light is not the friend of an assailant, use it to your advantage.
• Land Phone Line – $30 a month or less. While most of us all use cell phone, a landline gives emergency responders an EXACT address of a 911 call. Cell phones offer approximate locations at best. If an intruder were to approach the door, simply picking up the phone and dialing 911 and setting the phone to the side will send police to your address.

Be Safer Rule # 3 – Beware of Strangers
Spot an unfamiliar face? Be on guard and watch their body language. Most non-domestic apartment assaults resulting in a rape or shooting are committed by an assailant the victim does not know.

While some of these recommendations seem like common sense, it is very easy to get too comfortable and put off implementing these quick and easy steps that could save your life.

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If you or someone you love has been the victim of a violent crime, we understand the pain and psychological damage that can follow. We also understand all of the legal implications and are here to help you- contact us anytime.

PART TWO: The Search Continues…

Thanks for coming back to read PART TWO of our three-part Apartment Safety Guide. Today we will continue to review considerations that could help you find the safest place to live.

Search Rule # 3 (for rules 1 and 2 see PART ONE of the series) – Review the Overall Condition of the Property
Walk around the complex during the day. Note how all the buildings are maintained. Are the grounds manicured? Are common areas neat? Is trash lying around? Are the laundry areas secure and clean? If there are luxuries such as a pool area or weight room, are they also well-maintained? The answers to these questions will give you an initial understanding of how the landlord and the residents treat the property.

Also, tour the property at night with a property or leasing manager or courtesy officer. This should be arranged ahead of time. The vast majority of violent crime at apartment communities happens at night. If the management team is unwilling to be on the property after dark, you can be sure they are concerned about safety – and you should be, too. If you are able to tour at night, notice whether people are loitering in the common areas and whether there seem to be people “hanging out” who don’t live on the property. Again, unchecked loitering is often a sign of more serious criminal activity.

Search Rule # 4 – Be Picky about Your Location within an Apartment Building
When speaking with leasing agents, be clear that you will only consider an apartment that is located at least on the 2nd floor. It may make moving in more difficult and you may not want to climb stairs every day. But, ground floor units are most common for assaults and rapes. Most burglaries and stranger-on-stranger assaults are crimes of opportunity – and most criminals don’t carry ladders. The more difficult it is for an assailant to enter your window, the more likely he is to move on to another apartment.

Search Rule # 5 – Ask the police
Find out what county the apartment community is in and contact the police department that serves that community. Many larger departments – like DeKalb County and City of Atlanta – have crime prevention specialists who can give you information about particular properties that receive more calls for police assistance. Detectives in smaller police departments will often also have similar information, especially about problem properties.

Search Rule # 6 – Check for Offenders in the Area Online
Search by address on the Sex Offender Registry for any registered sex offenders in a given neighborhood.

Search Rule #7 - Ask Your Prospective New Neighbors a Few Questions
While you are there looking at the property, try finding a person coming or going. Here are 3 questions that take less than 30 seconds to answer.

1. Does management respond quickly to an issue?
2. Are you aware of any crimes on the property?
3. Do you plan to renew your lease?

Join us next week for PART THREE in which we will review a few rules on how to make your CURRENT residence even safer!

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If you or someone you love has been the victim of a violent crime, we understand the pain and psychological damage that can follow. We also understand all of the legal implications and are here to help you- contact us anytime.

This is the first of our three-part blog series on finding and maintaining the safest apartment possible, regardless of your neighborhood. Whether you live in a Georgia area considered safe or more risky, it’s worthwhile to protect yourself by following a few simple rules when choosing your next residence or making some easy adjustments that will make you a bit more secure at your current residence.

PART ONE: The Apartment Search

If you are considering living in an apartment, you should first learn as much as possible about:

• the location and history of the apartment property
• the people who live and congregate on the property
• the location and physical integrity of the individual apartments you’re considering
• the management and maintenance staff

FACT: The vast majority of violent apartment attacks occur at properties that allow non-violent property crime and loitering to go unchecked.

Search Rule # 1 – Location: Know as much as you can about the community.

You know the old advice about what three things are most important when buying a house? LOCATION! LOCATION! LOCATION! This is just as important when choosing an apartment.

As apartment communities go, your safety depends primarily on WHERE you live. This is less about zip codes or school districts than about WHO else lives in the area, WHO is attracted to the area, WHO congregates in the area, and HOW these people spend their time.

CRIME HISTORY is the #1 predictor of future crime. Ideally, you would go to the local police department and obtain copies of reports of crime for all of the apartment properties you’re considering. But, in most jurisdictions it would take months to get these, and you probably don’t have that kind of time. Instead, you can and should ask the leasing staff of any community you’re considering, to allow you to review the incident reports and police reports they have on file for at least the previous 3 years. If they tell you they don’t keep these reports or refuse to let you see them, you should mark this community off your list of possibilities.

“Curb Appeal” Does Not Guarantee Safety – while those newly planted pansies and shiny balloons may get you into the leasing office, be aware that these are marketing strategies, first and foremost.

Do all of the Vehicle Control Gates work? Are they often damaged or out of order? Is there a record of repair available for you to review? Controlled Access Gates Do Not Guarantee Safety. Many properties advertise the presence of vehicular control gates in order to attract new tenants. Make sure they work properly!

“Courtesy Officers” are not the same as security guards – in fact, most landlords specifically attempt to disclaim any responsibility for their tenants’ safety in the language of their lease. Do not be fooled. Most landlords give free or reduced rent to off-duty police officers whose main job is to hand out tenant letters and eviction papers – and to help protect the landlord’s property from getting damaged. And, most landlords tell their tenants not to report crimes to the courtesy officer but to call 911, directly.

Search Rule # 2 – Consider the Property’s Parking Lots

Walking alone from your car to your apartment or mailbox may put you at risk. Consider where you would be parking on a prospective apartment property and make sure you would be able to do the following to keep yourself safe:

• Back your car into a parking spot or in a position that eliminates as many blind spots as possible as you get out of your car
• Have a clear line of sight to your apartment or mailbox from wherever you park.

Next week, in PART TWO we will discuss more tips for searching out the safest possible home, and stay tuned for PART THREE in which we provide easy tips for improving the safety of your existing home - no matter where you live.

Contact

If you or someone you love has been the victim of a violent crime, we understand the pain and psychological damage that can follow. We also understand all of the legal implications and are here to help you- contact us anytime.

While it was first observed nationally in 2001, April “officially” became National Sexual Assault Awareness Month when President Obama proclaimed it to be so, earlier this month.

The focus of this year’s SAAM campaign is the prevention of sexual assault on college campuses. Many school administrators have recently been under fire for not taking strong enough preventative and/or punitive measures for what is a prevalent problem on their campuses.

It is estimated that one in every five women will be sexually assaulted before they graduate from college, according to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). Some estimates are as high as one in four. President Obama called these numbers “alarming” and his actions in this matter underscored the need for awareness and prevention of sexual assault in the United States as well as the need for funds to help victims.

“During National Sexual Assault Awareness Month, we recommit ourselves not only to lifting the veil of secrecy and shame surrounding sexual violence, but also to raising awareness, expanding support for victims, and strengthening our response,” said the President in his press release on the first of April.

In line with his mandate, the President doubled the funding for the Sexual Assault Services Program, which is the first-ever fund designed solely to provide services to sexual assault victims. The Sexual Assault Services Program is part of the Violence Against Women Act, which was reauthorized by Vice President Biden in 2005.

This year’s SAAM campaign was designed to bring resources and information together. The NSVRC creates many of the materials for the campaign, but they encourage local organizations that are dedicated to creating awareness of sexual assault to tailor the materials to the needs of their specific community, with prevention being the main objective.

To honor the 2010 SAAM campaign, Associate Attorney General Tom Perrelli, along with eight members of DOJ’s top leadership, traveled to eleven different public and private college campuses around the U.S. In each location, they held a series of events and meetings with faculty, students, community partners and law enforcement. Their main purpose was to promote discussion about how colleges can respond in innovative ways to the problem of violence against women – not just sexual assault but also relationship violence and stalking.

Many of these campuses receive a grant from the DOJ’s Office of Violence Against Women to encourage colleges and universities to react strongly to these crimes against women that are perpetrated by their male students.

SAAM 2010 ramps up with the “SAAM Day of Action,” which is Tuesday, April 20, with a day of special focus on awareness of sexual assault, coordinated special events and media coverage.

If you have been a victim of a sexual assault, contact us – we specialize in this type of personal injury. Don’t let this crime go unnoticed or unpunished. We can help.

The majority of men who perpetrate these crimes are not expelled from school, even when they are found to be guilty by campus officials. A major reason for this is that many school officials assume that the students who commit these acts are good people whose judgment is impaired by alcohol. Experts argue that most of these people are actually serial predators. Only 10 to 25 percent of these students are expelled from school

According to the Center for Public Integrity, between 1998 and 2008, out of 24 complaints responded to, the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) ruled against only five universities for failing to properly discipline male sexual offenders. Yet, the five universities received no punishment, they were only ordered to improve their disciplinary procedures.

According to a story originally reported by National Public Radio, Margaux, a student at Indiana University, was raped by a fellow student one night after she had returned to her dorm room drunk. Another female student came forward and said that the same man had also attempted to rape her in her dorm room, but that she was able to fight him off. Eventually, the administrators came to the conclusion that Margaux was, in fact, raped. Despite this, the perpetrator was expelled from school for only one year.

The student who raped Margaux was allowed back on campus under the conditions that he undergo counseling, get treatment for alcohol abuse and that he stay away from his victim. Margaux fought back, taking her case to the OCR, which concluded that the school did not need to change its course of action in disciplining the rapist. When she found out that she would have to walk the campus with the man who raped her, she dropped out of school.

Educators—not lawyers—run college and university disciplinary systems. Many campus sex crimes are passed off as inappropriate sexual conduct fueled by alcohol, and victims do not receive the justice they deserve.

If you have been victimized at your college or university, working with an attorney who specializes in personal assault cases can help you when your school’s disciplinary system falls short. We are here to help- Contact us today if you have been the victim of a violent crime.

Financing of the project was made possible by an 8-year, interest free loan from the State of Kansas. Read News Story Here

“We’re excited about it,” said Chief of Campus Police Greg Schneider. “It’s the latest technology in helping us fight crime and provide for the safety of the community. With such instances of campus violence that have occurred at Columbine, Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois and other schools, campus security has emerged as one of the top concerns, especially for students and parents when selecting colleges and this helps us meet those concerns.”

With a staff of 13 full-time and 20 part-time officers, KCKCC has long had a record for very few major crimes such as homicide, rape, robbery and assault. However, Schneider says that is not enough.

“My philosophy is what is major?” asks Schneider. “If a student, for instance, is the victim of a crime, it still has its effects. The theft of a text book may not be classified as a major crime but it’s something that must be replaced and the student might not have the money for its replacement. So for that student, it’s a major crime.”

Schneider said the most common crimes are those of opportunity, the theft of unattended or mislaid property. However, the installation of the new security system will be a valuable assistance to helping officers track down such perpetrators.

With the installation of 104 cameras throughout the campus, police are not only able to keep a surveillance on entrances, hallways, offices and rooms but they are able to go back through video to look at specific areas at the time the crime was committed.

In addition to the 104 surveillance cameras, the new system provides card access to all campus buildings, campus-wide notification of fire, tornado and other warnings and a React system.

The card access system allows only select individuals to gain access to exterior doors when the college is not otherwise open.

“Not only does it give us controlled access to the building but it also allows us to lock and unlock exterior doors at certain times and to lock down the building immediately if necessary,” said Schneider.

Previously, custodians had to go to each door to either open or close.

The fire and tornado alert replaces a long-outdated warning system that was installed with the opening of the new campus in 1972.

The new fire alarm system provides not only detection of smoke and/or fire with state of the art sensors but the capability to identify exactly where the incident is occurring and is a major upgrade that has added to the safety of the campus. Fire and other first responders will know exactly where to concentrate their initial efforts.

More than 1,000 smoke and/or heat detectors have been installed across the campus, all connected by fiber optic cable to a central command module.

Also, the single fire/security system is in every building on campus, a significant upgrade from the prior system, which was a patchwork of systems that were added to the original 1972 system as new buildings were added to the campus.

In addition to having the capabilities to provide an alert to the entire campus for a fire or tornado, the system provides voice direction and guidance to specific areas.

“For instance, if we had a fire in the lower Jewell, we could direct people away from that area instead of them going to it,” said Schneider. “Or if we had a shooter in the Humanities building, we could give the voice command to lock down all the rooms. And all doors are locked when they are closed so there’s no fumbling to lock a door in an emergency.”

The React system allows for quick notification to campus police in the case of emergencies. “We have 50 computers on campus capable of notifying us immediately by simply clicking on an icon,” said Deputy Chief Jason Sievers. “From the emergency button we will know exactly where the emergency is happening. Also, it allows us to text, e-mail or call in case of emergencies to all faculty and staff who have signed up for immediate, emergency notification.”