UPDATE: I posted on Nextdoor for my local neighborhood. Girl was identified and someone reached out to her. She said her phone had died, she got turned around and just needed directions. But she made it home ok!! :)
True story, by the way. This happened to me earlier tonight.
Mid-size city, 500K people. Suburbia area. Well lit. Good part of town. Next to parks, schools, etc. Nice weather.
9:30 tonight (Sunday), I was in the house putting away some laundry. I heard the doorbell. I didn’t think anything of it, because I have been getting lots of amazon deliveries.
30 seconds or so later, a knock on the door. Wow, delivery guy is def letting me know I guess.
So I finish folding my laundry, go to front porch. Probably 5 to 10 minutes since knock on door. No package. Weird.
I check my porch camera and it shows a teen girl, maybe 15 or so, out of breath ringing the doorbell. She’s wearing pajama bottom pants, shoes, hoodie and a backpack. And she says to herself, “I need help. This is terrible.”
She sets on my front step for a few seconds, gets up, then knocks on door. Looks around. Then leaves.
After I see vid, run to sidewalk… look up and down. Nothing. I run back in, put shoes on, go out and again, looking. Nothing.
I call 911 tell the police what happened, they send someone out, but they don’t get here till about 30 minutes later. So basically police show up a full 45 minutes after the girl knocked on my door.
While waiting for police, I see neighbor, 2 houses down, pulling out of driveway. I run up to him, show him vid, tell him what happened, he says he’ll check his cams, but he didn’t get a knock or doorbell ring.
I’m kicking myself that I didn’t at least check the porch cam right when doorbell rang. I legit can not stop thinking about that girl knocking on a strangers (my) door hoping I would answer.
She was out of breath, but wasn’t banging on the door extra loud or anything. No crying. And I have neighbors all over and across the street. And just a block down is a 7-11.
So it probably wasn’t super serious (I hope!), and maybe she just lost her phone or something (I hope!). But I can’t sleep thinking about it.
I posted the vid to my local nextdoor community webpage, posted on facebook, etc. All in the hopes that someone will recognize her.
What would you guys do in this situation? Anything I could have done differently (other than answer the door)?
tl;dr: I ignored doorbell thinking it was just amazon package. Check porch cam later and realize it was teen girl saying she needed help and that something terrible happened. Police didn’t arrive till 45 minutes later and no sign of girl.
Yeah, it’s weird. And yes, I am in the states. And actually police are pretty trustworthy here, it’s just the bad ones that make the news, and the bad news is what everyone reads.
But in this case, the police just seemed like it wasn’t worth the effort. And that may be true. I posted on a neighborhood site and the vast majority said it was probably just a scam or someone wanting to ask for money.
Now that I’ve had time to reflect, I’m not as upset by it. Because there were plenty of other places on my street and in this part of town that she could have gone if really in distress. Still wish I would have answered the door sooner, but I’ve followed the local news since, and it doesn’t seem like anything bad happened. So probably all worked out.
That’s a very good point. Not going to lie, I’m still convinced there is something pretty wrong in some law enforcement avenues, but you’re right that the cop killings make the news quickly (although once would be one to many).
Yeah weird situation, curious what the actual story is here.
Actually, all solved. I updated the original post. So basically, after I posted video of it on a neighborhood networking page, a friend of my gf’s reached out. She asked if she could post on her social media as well. And that worked. Because someone identified the girl, and contacted the girl.
Turns out, she was going home from a friends house, got turned around and a little lost since it was dark. Her phone died. My house had living room lights on and I also have a cute “Little Free Library” sharing library in my front yard, so she felt safe knocking and asking for directions.
When I didn’t answer she went back to the main street, figured out her where she was, and made it home fine.
I still feel bad that I missed her out there, but very relieved that all turned out well and ended up being not being a big deal. And happy it wasn’t a scam, like so many were saying. :)
Oh no doubt. But from news media, I think non-US people get the impression that this is just a lawless wild-west scenario, and if you run into a police officer, you life is in danger!
Not like that at all. Also the news you see is mostly from crowded inner cities. Most of the US is quiet, peaceful rural towns or quiet suburbia. My neighborhood is near a park and schools. I can walk out and hear kids playing outside. Flying kites on a windy day. Kids walk down my street to the ice cream shop. People walking their dogs.
The vast vast majority of US is just people being nice and going on with their lives. And that’s not news. News is a shooting or trial etc.
And Lemmy especially is not a good indicator of the US at all. Most lemmy commenters are computer nerds in cities who rarely leave their houses and are anti-social, and make political strife and chaos a part of their identity.
Most of the US is boring. Which is a good thing. But boring isn’t news.