It’s not often that you see video footage of a hotel room break-in attempt from inside the room, so this is quite interesting…
Thieves try to open Holiday Inn room door
As flagged by View from the Wing, NBC Bay Area has the story of a recent room break-in attempt at a Holiday Inn in San Jose, California. A woman who was traveling on business was inside her hotel room, when she suddenly noticed that someone was trying to break into her room.
Specifically, someone was using a device that can be slid under the door and then moved around, in an attempt to grab the door handle and open it from outside. It almost looks like an extended coat hanger with pieces attached to it. I’m not sure if this is ever used in an official capacity by hotels (maybe if key cards stop working and/or there are electrical issues), or if this is purely designed for attempted break-ins.
Presumably the robbers were trying to access an empty room, though in this case the guest was occupying the room. I’m impressed by how quickly she acted, since understandably many people might be confused in situations like this. She moved the device around so that it couldn’t get onto the door handle, and at the same time called the front desk.
Hotel workers ended up confronting a man and woman. These are the same two people that the guest had seen earlier through the peephole, when they attempted to knock on her door (which she ignored). The two people told the hotel employee that they were looking for a friend and had knocked on the wrong door. Unfortunately the duo managed to escape before police arrived, and weren’t identified.
The guest thinks her room was targeted because it was at the end of the hall, so that’s probably where the robbers started. And when they didn’t hear any noise there, they probably thought that was a good room to target.
You can see a news story about the incident below, including an interview with the victim.
My take on this attempted break-in
A couple of thoughts on this…
First of all, this guest did a great job handling this situation. She had her door locked, and she acted quickly when the break-in attempt happened. I think most people would probably be caught off guard in such a situation. So it’s good that she protected herself as well as she did. Then again, I imagine the robbers would have run anyway when they discovered that the room was occupied.
My other biggest takeaway is that I’m a bit confused by the motive of such a robbery, at least in terms of risk vs. reward:
- Trying to rob a hotel room is extremely risky; you have limited entry and exit points, and typically have cameras throughout the hotel, so it can be hard to get away
- Trying to rob a hotel room also seems pretty low reward; at most you might get a small amount of cash and credit cards, and some clothes, so is that really worth the risk?
Bottom line
A guest staying at a Holiday Inn in San Jose caught someone trying to break into her room on tape. Specifically, someone tried to use a device to open the door handle from inside. She physically prevented that from happening, while also calling the front desk. The robbers claimed they were “knocking” on the wrong door, and managed to escape.
What do you make of this attempted room break-in?
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