By Chase Cookson

I have four xcams, that I purchased a couple of years ago. I moved into a house last August in a run down part of Lawrence, a college town in Kansas.

Late one night, as I was laying on the couch, I heard some movement outside of my kitchen window. I simply clicked the button on my remote to switch to my porch cam. I listened for a few seconds through its amazingly sensitive microphone, and could hear something on the side of my house.

I switched to my side camera, which has no sound (Only my porch cam is wired, the other three are wireless), and could plainly see two young kids in my car, one in each seat. I don't have the night vision cameras, I just have porch lights, but even that small amount of light is enough to see people clearly at night. I could tell these were people I did not know.

I called 911 and told them what was going on and stepped outside, placing myself in between my car and theirs, which was parked on the street. I yelled to both to get out of my car and lay down on the ground. They looked like they were about to run, so I yelled out that I had security cameras around my house, and had them both on videotape. I saw the kid that had been sitting in the passenger seat look over his shoulder, and he could plainly see the camera on the side of my house - I bet he wish he would've noticed it earlier.

The police showed up within a couple minutes, and were impressed with the security that the X10 cams afforded me. In my car, freshly removed from the dash, was a Pioneer CD/DVD unit worth upwards of $500. The interior of the car is wired with all kinds of lighting, which they were attempting to remove. They had already opened my trunk, with the intention of stealing another $1500 worth of audio equipment: two amplifiers, three 12" subwoofers, and an equalizer.

I provided the police with my footage. The lawyers for the two kids, after reviewing the tapes, decided it would probably be best to just plead guilty.

Thanks X10!!! Spending a couple hundred on your cameras saved me a couple thousand worth of loss through theft!!!

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