According to a 2008 study carried out by the Anti-Crime Research Center at the Ministry of Interior, the number of burglaries in the Kingdom has been on the increase due to people not taking proper security precautions.

The study also revealed that the majority of victims do not ask relatives, friends or neighbors to check on their homes when they travel.

Saleh Ghalib, a 44-year-old father of four who lives in Jeddah’s Rawdah district, said his home was robbed last year when he was away on holiday for three weeks during the summer. “We found my wife’s jewelry had been stolen together with SR40,000 in cash. I had locked all of the doors and told my family to check on the house every few days, but someone in the neighborhood must have told them that the home was empty,” he said.

Ghalib said the robbery was a lesson learned the hard way. “Now I have security alarms all over my house. I found out that they had entered through the back door which was very easy to break,” he added.

Ahmed Badr, a 35-year-old father of three, said his neighbor’s house was robbed last summer and that was when he began looking after his father’s home. “I live in an apartment so I don’t worry about my house being robbed but my father travels a lot and lives in a big house. I go there twice a day, park my car at the front and switch on the lights so people in the neighborhood think there is somebody inside,” he said.

He added that the burglars who robbed his neighbor’s home stole gold, a new plasma TV, antiques and mobile phones all worth SR8,000. “They even tore mattresses looking for any money or gold that may have been stashed inside,” he said.

Fatima Abdul Kareem, a 26-year-old employee, said her grandmother’s house was once robbed and that the police later found out that a domestic worker had let the burglars in while she was abroad.

“My grandmother lives alone and travels a lot because my uncles live abroad … she has a maid and a cook who disappeared after the robbery. Around SR60,000 and a diamond set had been stolen,” she said. She added that the home is located on a main street, which makes it difficult for someone from the outside to come in without the help of somebody inside.

Mohammed Aboud, a 58-year-old who lives close to Sari Street, said he has a timing device at home that automatically switches the lights on when he is traveling. “I’ve heard about many robberies in our neighborhood and thought it is better to be safe than sorry and so installed iron doors with extra locks. My wife and kids say I am obsessed with extra doors but we travel in the summer for a month and a few times during the year as well,” said Aboud.

Maj. Zaki Al-Rehaili, spokesman for Makkah police, advised people who travel in the summer to take extreme precautions because it is a time when homes are frequently burgled. “People should never leave valuables like jewelry and big amounts of money in the house when they travel even if it’s a short trip for three days. There are safety boxes in banks,” he said.

Al-Rehaili warned people against hiring illegal domestic workers who are more prone to being involved with criminal gangs. “Some people bring some workers they find on the street to carry their suitcases which is also wrong. We’ve received many cases in which burglars robbed the homes of people who had previously invited them to carry out maintenance work,” he added.

He also said people should lock their doors properly and ensure they cannot be easily broken. “We advise people to tell someone they trust like a neighbor or a relative to check on the house every few days and make it look like there are people there,” he added.

Al-Rehaili also said burglars usually steal money and items that can easily be carried to avoid attracting suspicion. “We rarely get cases in which fridges, furniture or air conditioning units are stolen because that would raise suspicions,” he said.

The risk of being burglarized can be greatly reduced by taking simple steps to make your home more difficult to enter and less enticing to would-be burglars.