From time immemorial, criminals began to mark houses and apartments that are being raided. Remember the story of Ali Baba and the 40 thieves? From time to time, prosperous areas are seized by panic - they say, mysterious signs of various configurations appear on the walls in the entrances, mailboxes and even doors. And we are talking not only about Moscow, the Moscow region, St. Petersburg or, say, Nizhny Novgorod, but also about the cities of Ukraine, Great Britain, Austria and even Chile.
Residents were frightened by advertising stickers pasted on doors with offers of round-the-clock services of a plumber or computer technician, geometric shapes drawn with chalk and charcoal, and other crosses or tac-toes. There was a version that these notes are encrypted information for burglars.
Let's say a crossed out circle means that there is nothing of value in the apartment. A flower or a cross, on the contrary, indicate that good prey awaits here. An open book or a triangle is easy prey, a rich old woman or a lonely defenseless lady lives here. Three parallel lines - “colleagues” have already visited the house and taken everything interesting, a staircase - it is recommended to give this room to another gang. And two intersecting rectangles or the sun - the owner is on the alert, the house is guarded and thieves will be met fully armed. Rhombus - non-residential house. Maybe this is some kind of very numerous and branched gang, almost a mafia, where many of the participants do not even know each other? And they cover entire cities. Some are engaged only in tipping and leave secret signs, while others, having seen and deciphered these signals, commit thefts. Still others take out, store and sell the loot.
According to numerous posts on the Web, these "secret signs" are used by burglars in Chile. But our threat department believes that this is an invention of Internet bloggers, an attempt to arouse the interest of users. Infographics: "RG" / Leonid Kuleshov / Mikhail Faleev
Where is the truth and where is the fantasy?
The detectives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs told the correspondent of "RG" that such an encoding is a fictitious "horror story", a legend for naive inhabitants. There is no need for such ciphers - who will set them and for whom? In practice, a gang of apartment thieves rarely exceeds 10 people. They, of course, have a division of labor and duties, but they all know each other perfectly by sight. Therefore, it makes no sense to create some special, moreover, universal cipher. It is always easier to verbally agree among themselves what is what. Moreover, those "secret signs" that apartment thieves actually leave carry completely different information than rumor ascribes to them.
Modern burglars leave the so-called beacons exclusively for themselves in order to find out the life algorithm of the apartment owners. For example, they stick a match, a hair or a thread in the door, throw a coin on the mat, even put a piece of biscuit allegedly dropped by a neighbor. And they look to see if a match or a thread has fallen out, if a coin has been thrown away, if a cookie has been crushed - which means that the owners are not away. Then it remains to find out when they are at home, and indeed, how many inhabitants are here. To do this, visual surveillance is established behind the apartment, which does not require a whole mafia structure at all, 2-4 people are enough, who replace each other. And they certainly do without graphic symbols on mailboxes, walls or doors to convey information. On the contrary, they in every possible way avoid at least something to attract the attention of the owners. They do have punctures though. For example, attentive owners may notice some suspicious marks and stains on the doors. It is possible that the thieves, picking up keys and master keys, made casts from the locks and did not erase the imprints of the thickening mixture in a hurry. Moreover, if they manage to clear one castle completely, then the second one is unlikely.
Often, "secret signs" for thieves appear as if by themselves. Criminal gunners will always notice letters, advertising booklets and other correspondence accumulated in the mailbox - evidence that the owners are away. They can check the readings of the electric meter if it is installed in the entrance in the old fashioned way. They can identify a rich owner by his car. It's simple. A certain gentleman parked in a Mercedes or Lexus and then went to his house. It is enough to bring it to the threshold of the apartment and, as they say, take it into “development”.
The paradox is that the most convincing "secret signs" for thieves are left by the apartment owners themselves. And without suspecting it. Neighbors or friends, even grandmothers on a bench near the house, can become a source of information about the well-being of the owners. It is enough for the gunner to sit next to them, smoke and listen to learn a lot of interesting things. For example, what was bought from furniture a week ago and when the owners went on their next vacation to the Canary Islands. Often, we ourselves brag to our friends about new purchases and share plans for a vacation. And as for children who love to brag to their peers about the "coolness" of their parents, there is nothing to say.
But the most surprising thing is that many themselves invite the robbers to visit them. They do it in in social networks. Colorful albums with photos of where they are, what they buy and how they live well in general, literally scream: come and steal all this from us! What is happening is that experienced thieves have been literally living in social networks for a long time, pretending to be friends, liking photos and finding out addresses where you can “successfully enter”.
How they steal in Moscow
Up to 2,000 burglaries are committed annually in Moscow. Of these, 80% on weekdays, when the owners are at work or study, from 9 to 17 hours. Every fourth is revealed. 90% of thefts are committed by non-working people, 60% by non-residents, and the same number by professional organized groups.
How to protect yourself from apartment thieves?
It is clear that it is desirable not to brag about your wealth, then there will be no criminal applicants for it.
But the best protection is an alarm system, that is, centralized security, when a message about an intrusion into a protected object is sent to the control panel of the operational duty officer for the unit - either the police or the private security company. That is, the light bulb lights up, the address is displayed, and an immediate response group is sent there. These are well-trained strong guys, dressed in body armor and armed with automatic weapons. Representatives of private security, in addition, recommend installing an alarm button in their homes. Better yet, get a remote control that you should always carry with you. If there was a sudden attack, it is possible to press the button without the villains noticing.
Even the so-called false alarm, that is, its layout, can scare away thieves. After all, not every burglar will dare to check the authenticity of the equipment.
It will create fear for robbers and the presence of a dog in the apartment - no one needs noise and extra hassle with aggressive animals.
Dossier "RG"
Under the protection of non-departmental security today there are 1 million apartments and 166 thousand places of storage of property of citizens (mainly garages). There are 266,000 such apartments and houses in the Moscow region and 33,000 places where property is stored. Last year, there was not a single successful theft from an apartment, a private house and other objects, the owners of which entered into an agreement with private security. However, if this does happen, private security will compensate the owners for damage - this is separately stated in the contract.
As you know, burglary is a very common crime, but it is not always commonplace. Sometimes real criminal virtuosos encroach on the private property of citizens, so Ocean himself and his friends could envy their ingenuity and skill.
Guided by the principle "forewarned - it means forearmed", "MK" figured out what to do to protect his apartment from uninvited guests. What things do modern burglars take out first of all? How are potential victims selected? How is the Internet used? All these questions of "MK" were answered by the former detective of the criminal investigation department in one of the district departments of Moscow, Igor GRISHAKOV.
- Igor Nikolaevich, which apartment is the most attractive for a burglar?
Depending on what attacker we are dealing with - a professional or an amateur. With professionals, everything is more or less clear: they steal where they are sure that there is money, they work on a tip. Lonely lovers commit spontaneous burglaries. For example, such a spontaneous thief can be a drug addict who goes for a dose, and he does not have enough money to buy drugs. In my practice, there was a case: a man got up at night to go to the toilet and in the corridor met a lone burglar who chose his apartment by chance, just walked up the stairs and decided to “look into the light” ... While the owner of the apartment was recovering from a meeting with a stranger, he managed to run away.
A "spontaneous" thief will covet the apartment, which is the least protected. Most likely, it will be an apartment on the first floor, with plastic windows(they are easiest to open if not additional protection). At risk are also apartments, next to the windows of which there is a gas pipe or a fire escape: they can easily climb into the dwelling.
- It’s clear with singles, but how do professionals work? How are their roles assigned?
Here everyone really has his own role and area of responsibility. For example, one person in the group must be driving. Such a person brings his accomplices "to work", waits for them, reports a potential danger. Two more are directly working on the spot: someone is watching the situation on the floor, the other, a specialist in locks, opens the door. As a rule, no more than two people work in the apartment.
I remember there was a gang of apartment thieves who preferred "odnushki". In such oversized apartments, all the wealth is in one room, so it is much easier and faster to search. Moreover, "odnushka" does not mean that you are poor. In general, for one-room apartment two people are enough.
Do thieves have "standards"? How long can you stay in the apartment? And at what time of the day do they get in most often?
I don’t think that there are “standards” as such, but they are in the apartment for about twenty minutes, no more. As for the time of day, they usually climb during the day when everyone is at work. Let's say the time from 12.00 to 14.00 can be called the peak of burglaries. At this time, everyone who was supposed to leave the house had already left, and had not yet returned for lunch. I remember that cameras were viewed on one apartment theft, which recorded how the thief safely left the apartment - and literally the owner went there for him. Passed by 10 minutes...
- What places in the apartment do thieves comb without fail?
Lone thieves grab whatever comes first. It can be a bag in the corridor, outerwear ... I remember that a woman once applied with a statement from whom such a loner took out the only expensive thing from her house - a fur coat that her children bought for her. Yes, it happens. Thieves also love all kinds of boxes where you usually put jewelry or money, cabinets ... In places such as the kitchen, nursery, bathroom, they operate only if they know for sure: there is something.
- What do burglars most often take out of apartments?
Today, bulky items are stolen less, because it is very difficult to carry them out unnoticed. Let's say a stolen TV that cost 50 thousand rubles can be sold for 5 thousand, no more. What for? After all, you can take gold and turn it in at any jewelry store, where they accept scrap with pleasure and for good money. Therefore, what is in demand today is what you can take out unnoticed by putting it in your pocket: money, jewelry, expensive gadgets ... The expectation that even if the police "accept" right at the crime scene, the thief can always say that these are his personal savings or things.
- Can citizens determine that thieves are shadowing them?
Theoretically, of course, they can. In practice, as a rule, citizens do not notice this, because these specialists act very carefully. For example, would you be embarrassed by a pizza ad tucked into your front door? That's the majority of citizens - no. And at the same time, this is how thieves test the soil: if the next day the flyer sticks out in the door, it means that the apartment was empty. It’s just that any normal person, entering the house, will definitely throw out unnecessary garbage, right?
The same - with correspondence, perhaps? If there are a lot of letters in the mailbox, it means that no one has been at home for a long time ...
Well, the correspondence trick won't work today. It happens that in a day they put in mailboxes monthly rate letters. And some owners just don't look into them.
In our country, citizens are very fond of showing off new clothes, gifts, sharing vacation plans on social networks ... At first glance, a harmless status - “two days left before the vacation” or “a gift from a beloved husband” - can leave a person penniless in his pocket for the near future. When the Internet was not so widespread, the following scheme worked perfectly: they looked for car ads, called and asked if it was still relevant. If on the other end of the wire they said that the car was sold, this meant that the landlord already had money, while new car most likely not purchased yet. In general, another victim found ...
- What areas of Moscow are the most unfavorable in terms of burglaries?
Thieves love new areas, and there are a number of reasons for this. Firstly, there are working youth who can afford new housing. So they have money. Secondly, the thieves reason this way: those who bought an apartment in a new area may have set aside the money left after the transaction for a good car. Well, on top of everything else, in new areas, the police are still not so well oriented, there is little prevention. Under such conditions, it is easier for burglars and car thieves to work.
- Can you describe a potential burglar?
As a rule, these are men aged 25–35, of average build. I haven’t seen frankly fat ones - maybe everyone is more or less in shape due to the fact that sometimes you have to flee ... And as for nationality, I probably won’t reveal secrets here: mostly people from Abkhazia and Georgia work in this field .
From time to time, news flashes that this or that celebrity has become a victim of burglars. Recently, the house of singer Vladimir Kuzmin was robbed for 10 million rubles ... Does it make sense to protect their homes, even if such rich people cannot do anything?
Protecting your homes and apartments is a must. Even a sticker on the front door that the apartment is under security, or the cheapest camera that costs less than the cell phone that children buy today, can save you from intruders. Why would a thief break into a place where he can "light up" when the house is full of apartments without security? At the same time, if a specific task is set, then be sure: they will rob. And none of the most expensive alarm systems will help.
- Won't help even a resident of, say, the prestigious "golden mile" in Moscow?
Home burglaries are a market in which all zones of influence are distributed. Therefore, there are no accidental thefts. This is for you a resident of the "golden mile" - important person. For a thief, this is a fraerok who has earned a lot of money, and in the criminal world he is worth nothing. Moreover, to enclose the apartment of such an "upstart" is even welcome. If there is an indication, they will climb anywhere. Taboo - only on the apartments of those who support the thieves themselves ...
- How do thieves bypass dozens of security cameras, alarms and concierges in prestigious complexes?
Individual masters can open a lock of any complexity - this is the time. Getting into such a house by deceiving the concierge or security guard is also not a problem. In such houses on the first floors there are all kinds of beauty salons, shops, dentistry, etc. The professionals tell such believable stories that the guards let them through.
- Is it difficult to prove the guilt of a burglar?
The burglary is very difficult to prove. And then thanks to the little things that thieves come across. Once we hired a doorman, a Georgian, who worked alone, mostly climbing into pensioners' apartments. They took it almost from the apartment. But they could not show him anything: irrefutable proof is needed. And here stands a man with a long stick and a knife tied to it. We understand that he needs both a stick and a knife in order to get into apartments through the windows (with a stick he checks if the window is locked, and with a knife he cuts through mosquito net, if any). But prove that the intent was...
- What they were doing? Have you solved the crime?
Yes, they opened it. I remembered that quite recently I had a burglary trip: the victims were grandparents. There is practically nothing from the material evidence: a bottle with open Georgian wine, which the thief apparently wanted to take away, but changed his mind, and a couple of foreign coins in flower pot, which the thief dropped when he climbed through the window. I’ll run ahead and say that we didn’t find “fingers” anywhere.
In general, the Georgian was nevertheless escorted to the department, examined him and found in the pocket of his sweatshirt ... a dozen similar coins that I had previously found in a pot. Such a housekeeper-numismatist. I took him into the office and told him that his prints were found on the pot, on the coins and on the bottle of wine, and he had better confess. It was a bluff, but there was nothing left ... By the way, despite the fact that this “numismatist” worked alone, two such reputable lawyers came to pull him out. As a result, he sat down only for this single episode, although in fact there were a lot of them.
- And there were cases when they took with the loot in their hands?
It was so. The guys somehow walked around the hostel and collected everything: a phone, a tablet, a computer ... All this, according to their mental abilities, they handed over to one pawnshop, the owner of which worked with the police. One phone, of course, can be found, but ten is already too much. And it is very difficult to prove this particular type of crime. Basically, the work is built on trifles: here is a coin, here is a car puttied ... Everything is a matter of luck.
- Do organized gangs of burglars have higher support?
I do not presume to say, but in my practice there were very strange things. For example, somehow they accidentally took a gang of apartment thieves, who were caught for a very long time. The operatives knew that the burglars were driving a car with a special sign. And somehow the opera is going to dinner - and they see a familiar car. Naturally, they call the right place, a group leaves, the thieves are detained. And then strange things begin to happen: the car disappears somewhere, cases are transferred with the words, they say, your thefts are solved, the rest will be sorted out higher ... Look: there is a 20-year-old Georgian window operator who is visited by expensive lawyers, here is a serious gang , which is being dumped somewhere ... One can only guess who is in charge of this process.
ADVICE FROM A FORMER OPERATOR
● Keep large sums only in the bank, bank cells. At home, you can keep only a small amount needed at the moment.
● Befriend your neighbors. In old houses, where neighbors have been friends for many years, there are much fewer burglaries. People know each other and perfectly identify strangers in the entrance or near the house. As a rule, in such houses they do not hesitate to ask extra questions strangers. Such interest will surely frighten off the swindler.
● If you witness strange and suspicious behavior of a stranger in the stairwell, call the police. You should be alerted if he rings the apartment, looks through the keyholes, lingers at the door. If it is possible to photograph a stranger discreetly - photograph: such information can be very useful.
● When you go on vacation, ask a family member or trusted person to check your place from time to time.
● Install burglar alarm. If it is already installed, in no case do not neglect its activation.
Have you ever noticed that strange marks sometimes appear on some doors - as if a child, while playing, accidentally drew something? If you see marks on the doors, call the police immediately! Recently, the British police released a list of so-called "thieves' marks". These are special symbols with which burglars mark the houses and apartments of potential (and real) victims. More often […]
Have you ever noticed that strange marks sometimes appear on some doors - as if a child, while playing, accidentally drew something? If you see marks on the doors, call the police immediately!
Recently, the British police released a list of so-called "thieves' marks". These are special symbols with which burglars mark the houses and apartments of potential (and real) victims.
Most often they are applied with chalk on outside house, which is clearly visible from the street. This can be a front door, a wall or garage door, a gate, a fence, etc.
Unfortunately, the matter is not limited to Britain alone. Similar warnings can be heard from the police in Spain, Chile, China, Cyprus…
The list can go on, but it won't help. If the police in your country do not report anything like this, this does not mean at all that local thieves do not put such marks on themselves in your city.
On the contrary: according to some reports, after the publication of symbols in the press, many thieves refused to use them. After all, the more people know about them, the higher the likelihood that a badge that suddenly appeared on the house will arouse them ahead of time.
We urge you to be vigilant, do not leave your home unattended for a long time and call the police at the slightest suspicion. Of course, the alarm will not interfere.
British thieves began to leave special stickers on the homes of potential victims.
British criminals mark the houses they are about to rob with advertising stickers offering the services of a locksmith. The thieves have also developed their own apartment coding system, which allows them to determine whether it is worth robbing a particular house, according to British media.
Dozens of residents of the British capital turned to the London police with a complaint. They found stickers on the doors and mailboxes of their homes offering 24-hour locksmith services. Fake phone numbers were printed on these stickers. Thus, criminals are trying to determine how often the owners of the house open windows and doors, as well as the time when they are not at home. One such "marked" house has already been robbed, according to The Daily Mail. Stickers are usually pasted so that the owner of the house does not notice them.
In addition, British thieves have long come up with and use their own apartment coding system called the "Da Pinci code". This is a kind of communication system between thieves, which allows you to determine whether it is worth robbing a particular house or not. Thief marks, usually drawn in chalk, can also tell a lot about the owner's character. For example, a crossed circle means that there is nothing of value in the apartment. And flower petals are a good sign for criminals, meaning that there is something to profit from in the house. A sign in the form of an open book may indicate that a fragile and vulnerable woman lives in the house. The cross means "good target". Three parallel lines can tell that the house has already been robbed. Two intersecting rectangles may mean that the owner of the house suspected something was wrong. Thieves leave marks on the walls of houses, sidewalks and curbs.
It is worth noting that such labels already exist in many countries. For example, in Austria, thieves ring the doorbell of an apartment they spot and offer to buy a pool membership or subscribe to a daily newspaper. They start a conversation and try to learn as much as possible about the habits of the owner. Then strange marks appear on the doors of the apartments, scratched with chalk or charcoal. For example, the two letters AM mean "hack in the morning", the letter N - "hack at night". The painted staircase suggests that it is better to give up the apartment to another thief. From the drawn triangle, a thief can find out that a single woman lives in the house. Rhombus means that the house is non-residential. The sun is a bad sign for a thief. This means that someone is always present in the house.
In Russia, burglars use similar methods of work. Russian thieves first try to find out as much as possible about the daily routine of the residents, and only then they pay their visit. Frequent calls on the phone or at the door, as if they were mistaken, can also indicate that thieves' intelligence is operating.
Doodles with chalk or a marker, stickers on mailboxes and doors are not at all pranks of children, this is how criminals signal each other
The thief is watching you
Broken matches stuck in the gap between the door and the jamb, tiny chips, scraps of paper, hair or thread sticking out of the keyhole, and similar methods by which criminals often check whether the residents of the house are there, whether the door opens - this is not even yesterday, but the day before yesterday. Modern burglars have developed a whole system of signs - thieves' marks. They are left by accomplices-gunners who mark the houses and apartments of potential victims. These marks are left on entrance doors, gates, fences, garage doors, mailboxes, walls that are clearly visible from the street, sidewalks and curbs at the entrance to the dwelling. From the outside, they often look like children's scribbles or hieroglyphs - and indeed, children who work as gunners for adult bandits can really draw them. V different countries thieves' marks are different, each gang may have its own conventional symbol system, but very often they are repeated, there is a certain international "language". Recently, the British police even published a whole list of such marks, urging citizens to be vigilant. And, as it turned out, many signs from the British "Da Pinci code", as it is called in thieves' circles, coincided with or were very similar to those that the criminals left in Germany, Spain, Italy, Cyprus, Greece, Latin America. For example, a crossed out circle meant that there was nothing of value in the apartment, a cross was a good target, the letter “w” meant that the owners like to leave at night, three parallel lines or a triangle indicated that the house had already been robbed, the Roman “deuce” - there is something profit. There is also a special thieves' "macrame": on gates and fences country houses and summer cottages are tied with multi-colored shoelaces - their color and knots can also tell a lot to an insider about the owners and their well-being.
Black label for hosts
Especially often, thieves' marks appear on the eve of vacation and holiday seasons, as well as weekends, when many people like to leave. The gunner who left a sign for the bandits can be not only outsiders like unfamiliar teenagers loitering in the yard or pseudo-workers, but also “their own” - a janitor, a cleaner, a concierge. The latter are even more dangerous, because they know very well where lonely pensioners live, which of the tenants are richer, when someone leaves for work, who went on vacation ... Of course, if in every suspicious case you run to the police in a panic and talk about your suspicions - They will soon advise you to see a psychiatrist. However, it is worth being vigilant: inform the neighbors, the district police officer, and at the same time try to trace the pattern. If it turns out that only the apartments of neighbors who are away are marked, the district police officer must definitely be aware of such suspicions. And, of course, it is desirable to destroy such suspicious signs as soon as possible - to erase and so on. If these were indeed thieves' marks, this could save uninvited guests with criminal tendencies from visiting the home.
Mailbox - a godsend for a thief
According to unofficial information law enforcement, in Russia and Ukraine, burglars in recent years have especially liked to mark mailboxes. This is understandable: you can quickly find out from them whether the owners are in place, because if the box is full, most likely, the tenants are away. Yes, and leaving secret information on them is much easier than on doors - we traditionally pay less attention to mailboxes, and if children live in the house, signs can always pass for their pampering. They can draw “childish” scribbles on the boxes, mark them with multi-colored stickers like those that are glued on price tags in stores. The “black mark” can also be supposedly advertisements pasted on boxes or doors, especially if they are invisible and stuck in a very strange place.
Last year, strange multi-colored marks on mailboxes that appeared in several districts of Moscow at once alarmed Muscovites so much that it came to the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation. And then different areas were marked differently - the center of the capital - with black dots, residents of eastern Moscow found strange blue checkmarks on their mailboxes, and some mailboxes in houses in the VDNH area were marked with red circles. As a result, the Public Chamber appealed to the Ministry of Internal Affairs with a request to oblige district police officers, together with management companies, to pay attention to the cleanliness of mailboxes. As Anton Tsvetkov, head of the security commission of the Public Chamber of Russia, suggested, these marks could easily indicate the apartments of potential victims. According to him, painting on mailboxes is an old criminal trick. But did these secret signs give necessary information The Ministry of Internal Affairs and whether a gang of burglars really operated in the city at that time was not subsequently reported. It is only known that after the hype raised, the district police officers were ordered to be more attentive and promptly respond to all such messages.
