At 7:00PM today, someone knocked at my door. I asked who it was and the guy refused to give his name. When I asked if there was something I could help him with, he mumbled something and asked me to open the door. I said no and he left, and then I heard him knock on several doors nearby.
So anyway, be on the lookout for this dude. He looked maybe 45 years old, African American, and had a beard. He didn't appear to be selling anything, so I don't know what his deal was.
Weird. Did you call the police? Sounds very suspicious.
Which neighborhood?
I thought about calling the police but decided against it because he didn't really do anything illegal. But I thought I'd mention it here in case someone else had a similar experience. I live in the Penrose neighborhood.
Call the non-emergency number and tell them what happened. That description (though vague) could match this guy:
About five years ago, I was living near Tallula, and walked home around 10:30 pm from Clarendon. At one point, I thought someone was following me, but dismissed it and arrived home safely. Ten or so minutes after I got home, I heard a frantic knock on the door–the type that makes you think “fire” or “someone being attacked” so I–gah–opened the door. He had the screen/storm door locked fully open and started to put his foot out to block me from shutting my front door. I reacted very quickly, slamming the door shut and locking it. He wailed on the door for a good minute, throwing himself against it.
Seems like pretty standard bum regimen; if you lived in NYC you would probably get 5-10 of those a night.
Call the Police. That happened to my neighbor and when they didn't answer the door, the guy went around back and starting trying to pry open the back door. You never know, but if he is there and is up to no good, you need to let the police know he is in the neighborhood. He may be innocent but having the police find out who he is, doesn't hurt anything.
The other day in Penrose, a guy came to the door with some fake charity petition thing. Said he was collecting signatures and donations for some AIDS charity. It was pretty clearly fake as he had no literature, nothing. His description was similar to your guy.
We had something similar happen in Bluemont, with a man with a similar description. He knocked on the door and told us he did bad things in the past, was reshaping his life and was now selling magazines to be able to get his own apartment. If the sold a certain amount he could get promoted. We told him that we weren't interested. He got aggitated and said 'You don't want to help me get better?'. We politely said no again and closed the door, meanwhile keeping an eye out. We saw him a few weeks later riding his bike in our neighborhood.
Jessie said:
At 7:00PM today, someone knocked at my door. I asked who it was and the guy refused to give his name. When I asked if there was something I could help him with, he mumbled something and asked me to open the door. I said no and he left, and then I heard him knock on several doors nearby.
So anyway, be on the lookout for this dude. He looked maybe 45 years old, African American, and had a beard. He didn't appear to be selling anything, so I don't know what his deal was.
Time for a creepy black guy roundup!
(It's satire of another poster, Jessie, don't worry).
Back where I used to live there was a deaf guy who'd go around knocking on people's doors with a little card asking for money. There's a term for it (which I don't recall), but it's still kinda pathetic.
KalashniKEV said:
That’s VIBRANT.
Not too many tricks in that bag huh?
jjarl said:
We had something similar happen in Bluemont, with a man with a similar description. He knocked on the door and told us he did bad things in the past, was reshaping his life and was now selling magazines to be able to get his own apartment. If the sold a certain amount he could get promoted. We told him that we weren't interested. He got aggitated and said 'You don't want to help me get better?'. We politely said no again and closed the door, meanwhile keeping an eye out. We saw him a few weeks later riding his bike in our neighborhood.
That guy came to my door last weekend. My lady and I were in our room, all the windows were open, as was the front door – screen door was shut. For about 5 minutes we heard some guy outside yelling “Hellloooooo…. HELLOOOOO.” We both assumed it was our neighbor's homeless friend, then after another 5 minutes we heard a banging on the screen door so I went out and it was this guy trying to sell magazines and get promoted. The conversation was great:
Guy: Hi, I'm here trying to better myself and get my daughter back and get credits to pass this class and get promoted. I pride myself on my professional greeting, how would you rate my greeting?
Me: Well you stood outside our door yelling 'hello' for 10 minutes. It was annoying as hell, at some point you should've assumed we weren't coming to the door.
Guy: Oh, I'm sorry about that. You ever seen Bad Boys? That scene where Martin Lawrence walked into the Jamaican house and said “hello, can I borrow a cup of sugar?” That's what I was doing, I just wanted you to know I was here
Me: Yeah, I remember that scene, didn't it end in a gun fight? Are you telling me that's what's about to happen here?
There has been a guy on a bike fitting this description working the area around N Harrison St. from Wilson to Lee Hwy, probably for about a year and a half. He generally bikes around, either asking to do odd jobs, asking to pick up large scrap items, or just asking for money. I've encountered him several times at my house and at friends' houses. When I say the homeowner isn't available, he asks me to call the homeowner and gets pretty persistent. My dad usually just ends up giving him money. Seems fairly harmless but he has a different story every time.
KalashniKEV said:
CW said:
Seems like pretty standard bum regimen; if you lived in NYC you would probably get 5-10 of those a night.
That's VIBRANT.
Time for a black guy roundup, huh, Kev?
Or would that be, like, wrong?
58°
Fair
