An 11-year-old girl home alone when a robber broke into her house in Escondido Tuesday hid quietly in a closet and sent text messages to her mother reporting there was a stranger lurking inside, police confirmed.
The Escondido Police Department (EPD) said the young girl was at her home in the 2300 block of Live Oak Road just after 10:30 a.m. when an unknown man allegedly entered the residence.
Police said the girl saw the suspect but he did not see her. She quickly made her way into a closet and texted her mother to say someone was in their house. She stayed in there until the suspect was gone.
The girl’s mother alerted police. When officers arrived, they searched the home but could not immediately locate a suspect or suspects.
The EPD said the girl was unharmed.
The suspect was described as a 6-foot-tall man with a buzz-style haircut who was wearing baggy jeans. He left the home in a newer model extra cab truck that had a chrome diamond-plated tool box on it, police said.
The incident is under investigation.
U.S. & World
News from around the country and around the globe
Police said a couple of the rooms inside the family's home were ransacked, although it is unclear, at this point, what was taken from the home.
Investigators said the suspect forced entry into the house through the garage door.
Police said there was a report of a possible weapon involved in the robbery, but investigators could not confirm if the suspect who entered the home was armed with a weapon or if a firearm was taken from the residence in the robbery.
Authorities released the terrifying 911 call the mother had to make. NBC 7 San Diego typically does not play 911 calls, but this one provides a lot of information about what was going on at the time.
"Someone is robbing the house, I said, 'can you hear somone in the house?'", the mother told dispatchers.
On the call, the mother relayed what her daughter told her.
"And then I said can you get out? And she said, 'so scared, no (inaudible),' I said, 'where are you, hide.' 'I'm in the closet, help,'" the mother told dispatchers.
Officers remained at the scene for several hours collecting fingerprints and swabbing for DNA evidence, per standard procedure, the EPD said.
A law enforcement helicopter scoured the neighborhood in search of the suspect to no avail. Police officers also checked neighboring homes to see if there had been any other similar break-ins and searched the area for witnesses.
