A woman whose house was broken into in Orange is hoping a social networking page established on Facebook can help in the recovery of her stolen items.
IN spite of the best efforts of our local police, break and enters continue to happen on an alarmingly regular basis in ordinary suburban streets of Orange.
Denise O’Hara’s home was broken into on Friday night and apart from the theft of her “rainy day savings”, all of her precious photographic equipment was also taken.
Ms O’Hara admits she was badly shaken by the incident and hopes the stolen items will be returned to her thanks to a healthy word-of-mouth network that exists not only in Glenroi but throughout the city.
In fact, Ms O’Hara is hopeful the social networking page established by her California-based daughter will lead to the items’ recovery.
Similar to the old-school Neighbourhood Watch program, Facebook is now being used to spread information about a range of criminal activities.
Despite having only created the Facebook page on Saturday morning, by yesterday afternoon more than 400 people had already expressed their support for Ms O’Hara and offered tips on ways to recover the lost goods.
Of course Ms O’Hara is not the only one who has been targeted by thieves in the past several weeks; recently houses in Kurim Avenue, Torulosa Way and Ellard Place have joined the list.
Now more than ever it’s become important for people to keep an eye on their neighbours and do everything they can to secure their properties.
Whether it’s watching your neighbours’ comings and goings through your lounge room window or using Facebook to inform friends about crime in your area, it’s important the community works together to protect each other and ultimately reduce crime rates.
Any information garnered via these word-of-mouth networks can then be passed on to police who can ensure those responsible are brought to justice.