False-Alarm Calls Trigger Stiff Fines by Harried Police

Overwhelming numbers of false burglar alarms are prompting law enforcement agencies to impose a range of fines to help make up for lost time and manpower.

“It is extremely time consuming for patrol units,” said Sgt. Kate Nolan, a spokeswoman for the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department. “Each and every call is real until we get to the scene and secure the scene.”

Of the 48,000 alarm calls the San Diego Police Department receives each year, at least 98% are false, code compliance officer Laurie Davis said.

In any given 30-day period, San Diego residents are allowed two free false alarms. The third brings a $25 fine, and the penalties for subsequent infractions escalate from $50 to $200.

The Police Department requires alarm users to apply for a city permit for the device and refuses to dispatch officers to investigate any call from an unregistered system. About 35,000 permits are on file. About 75% of them are for homes or apartments.

Last year, Chula Vista police chalked up 6,530 false alarms, more than 98% of them false, said Mary Jane Diosdado, senior crime prevention specialist for the department. Fines are generally steeper than in San Diego.

The first two are free, the third carries a $50 price tag, the fourth $75, and the fifth and over $100. At six or more, a permit can be revoked or suspended, and the police can refuse to respond to subsequent activations.

Diosdado said chronic problems seem to plague businesses more than homes because commercial systems tend to have more motion detectors that are so sensitive they have been known to be triggered by mice, moths and spiders.

“One woman had 22 activations in her warehouse in a month,” she said. “Her cat set it off. I told her to get a dog.”

Another man who had repeated alarms at his warehouse wrote a “heartwarming” letter to Diosdado pleading with her not to fine him. A female bird had laid a nest near the alarm and the chicks kept setting off the alarm, he claimed.

At the San Diego Sheriff’s Department, which patrols unincorporated areas and cities such as Encinitas, Vista and Poway, officials say about 90% of the 2,100 alarm reports received each month prove to be invalid. The department has 13,000 alarm permits on file.

Though the agency levies fines for excessive calls, they still are a serious drain on manpower, spokeswoman Nolan said.

“If there is an alarm out in the backcountry,” she said, “sometimes we have to get a deputy out of bed in the middle of the night. . . . If it’s just a malfunction, we still have to pay him for time and mileage.”

Several years ago, Nolan said she was dispatched on one such alarm call on which she entered a home and surprised the occupants. “Let’s just say the residents were not in a state for receiving guests,” she said. “They got involved in what they were doing and forgot to deactivate the alarm.”