6. At Least He Was Ready

A Reddit user who goes by the name of FirstStateJake was so ready for a cat burglar when he was young, he almost made a huge mistake. “About three years ago I was staying at my grandmother’s house and sleeping in the living room. I heard someone messing with the front door and went to the basement to grab my shotgun (I’ve been shooting since I was 8 and know how to use it). I load four shells and wait behind the kitchen wall. The door opens and I swing around the wall and point the gun right at him…It was my cousin from North Carolina who was coming down for the weekend (something my brother failed to tell me). Funniest part was he just walked past and said “Quit messin’ around”

5. Almost Kidnapped by the Nanny

This person has deleted their reddit account since writing this story. However, I wanted to include this on the list, because the concept is terrifying. You think you can trust your nanny or babysitter to look after your kids. But this woman clearly got too attached to this toddler, and the result was insane.

“I was 3 years old, my older brother was 14. My mom and dad slept upstairs. A burglar (my nanny’s brother) broke into the house at night through my brother’s open window and he screamed. The robber got him in a choke hold and held a knife to his throat. When he took my brother into the hallway he looked up to see my fat, British, naked father standing on the other side with a .357 magnum trained on his head. The robber made it out of the house alive and my father didn’t take the shot as he ran away, as that is illegal here in California. My brother, who is now 36, still sleeps with a night light. Later it was discovered that the burglar’s intent was to abduct me because we were moving away and my nanny didn’t want to let me go.”

5. Industrial Apartments Seem Cool, Until You’re Living in a Literal Horror Movie

From Professionaleisure; “I was living in a 3 story building, with only the top floor as a semi-official apartment. The bottom 2 was a printing business and rooms for storage. This place was huge and dilapidated. The lights weren’t always working in the rooms of the business, lots of dark nooks and crannies. It was literally like something from the film SeVen. Anyway, I always thought I’d react so coolly during a robbery, but I actually just froze solid in bed out of sheer terror. I mustered sitting up in bed, and heard a person stepping out of the room beside my bedroom. It took me a good few minutes to fumble around for my phone, all the while listening. 

It took me about 10 minutes of nerve-wrecking silence to convince myself that the person had left, and I got up to investigate. I had a good 5 minutes sneaking around the top floor, trying to keep my ears open for any noise around the apartment. Made it to the kitchen where I stored a baton and a torch, and found the door that had been pried open. I had to basically search the whole building top to bottom to make sure the intruder hadn’t just hidden somewhere in one of the many rooms on the lower floors. The entire time, I was never entirely sure if the person had left, or was just around the corner. It was the most terrifying, adrenaline-inducing, heart-pounding half-hour of my life.”

4. The Cat Burglar Was At His Mercy

In this story from a Reddit user called Burnetts199, we see how acting before thinking can potentially get you in trouble. “During my sophomore year at University, I lived in a 4-story house notorious for throwing parties. Anybody could have used this opportunity to scope out what we had inside. One late Friday night around 4 am, my buddies and I heard some odd noises coming from the living room. As I walked down the hall, I saw the intruders drop what they were doing and bolt out of the side door. I ran out the door by myself and chased after them barefoot. During the pursuit, I see a large green suburban that is clearly their escape vehicle. One of the three cuts to the left and runs up somebody’s driveway. 

As soon as I caught up, I grabbed his shirt, threw him to the ground, secured one of his arms, and slammed my knee on his head. His friends ran over to rescue him. Since I was alone, I didn’t know if they would try to beat me up. So I lift my knee up off of his face. The kid gets up and runs away. To this day, I do not know why I didn’t beat the kid I had in the palm of my hand that had just robbed me. When I returned home, I discovered my Wii and my roommate’s car keys and iPod were missing. Looking back, I realize that I am lucky that they did not use any weapons against me, as I would have not had any way to defend myself. At the same time, it’s one of my biggest regrets.”

3. This University Student Followed A Burglar Until the Cops Showed Up

A reddit user named Gudgrim was brave enough to take matters into his own hands. “Was sitting on my computer playing games at around 16:30 (4:30PM) when I heard a sound. Thought my girlfriend might be home early from work. When I walk into my bedroom and I see a druggy standing there putting stuff in his pocket! I ran up to him screaming “what are you doing here!” and threw him to the ground and started picking his pocket for everything he had. Found my girlfriend’s engagement ring and an old wallet as well as his car keys. Well I didn’t want him in my apartment so I pushed him out the door and when I saw he had a bag right outside, I snatched it before him and locked my door.

In the bag was 4 mobile phones (not mine) and a projector from my university. He probably wanted it back since he was standing hammering at my door screaming that he had friends outside coming to get me and that it “needed to happen”, like it was planned or something. So I found my mobile and called the cops. I told him I was, and I could hear him leave. Proceeded to follow him on the street out of sight and talked to some operator that connected me to a civilian marked patrol car(?) that finally caught up with me and I could point him out in the crowd. He was arrested and justice served!”

2. This Child Cat Burglar Was So Dumb

Some people fantasize about living in a big frat house in college. Based on this story by the used called GoodandBluts, it’s probably not the safest place. “Lived in a shared student house when I was in my final year at university. In that 12 months, the house had 5 attempted burglaries. It had an alarm on it, which stopped 3 attempts. They kicked the door in, and the alarm scared them away. The fourth time I was home on my own, and I heard something from the back yard. I looked out the window and saw a youth with a brick in his hand. He made eye contact and dropped the brick, saying he had kicked his soccer ball into our yard and was trying to find it. The funny thing was this idiot was only from 3 doors down.

The final time, we were burgled when nobody was at home and nobody seemed to care about the wailing alarm – and the thief finally got hold of some of our possessions (guitar amps, etc). We mentioned the previous attempted break in to the police, and sure enough, they checked 3 doors down and found this imbecile sitting in his bedroom with all of our belongings.”

1. This Family Gets Revenge on the Cat Burglar Who Stole From Them

A Reddit user named craigeryjohn tells the story of how his dad almost got arrested for attacking the burglar. And the worst part is, she was someone who pretended to be their friend. “Woke up at 2am to a rustling sound. I go to the living room to find my mom’s ‘friend’ removing the tv, vcr, stereo, etc. She tells me my mom and dad had a fight, and she’s just helping my mom move out. Mom was at a party. She leads me back to bed, and continues to remove our belongings. While she is outside, I go to wake my dad. He begins yelling and choking her as she stands by her car full of our stuff. Immediately, we see police lights across the street. The two cops tried to arrest my dad. 

After a lot of arguing, they finally put her in cuffs and took her away. By the time we arrived at the county jail to press charges, she had been released. This woman was the Sheriff’s niece. There was a string of unsolved thefts in our county that summer. She didn’t come back for her car for a while. Rumor is that an angry family towed the car into the street, busted all the windows, slashed the tires, and recovered the patriarch’s wallet from the glove box. When the cops showed up, the family didn’t know who did it.”