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GREENSBORO — Cathy left her home in the middle of the afternoon on a warm March day to make the quick trip to pick up her daughter from preschool.

She checked all the doors and windows before she headed out to make sure they were secure. With the click of a dead bolt on her door, she got into her minivan and was on her way.

She returned 15 minutes later, and her 5-year-old daughter took off running inside the home. Mere feet away from the kitchen, they heard strange voices and the crinkling of what Cathy later learned was a bag of cookies taken from the pantry.

With a scream, Cathy gathered up her daughter and rushed back outside. A man came running out the front door with a bag of her belongings. She sat in her van staring face-to-face with the man who had just burglarized her home.

“To me that was a very close call for my youngest,” said Cathy, who requested her full name be withheld for fear of retaliation. “She was just steps away from being right there at him because she thought it was Daddy.”

Cathy is one of the many area residents hit this year by a home break-in, police and the Guilford County Sheriff’s Office say.

With school out, the problem has only gotten worse in the past month. The sheriff’s office reports a 39 percent increase in burglaries,  from 58 in May to 94 in June. In the city, the numbers have risen 31 percent, with 252 in May and 331 in June.

Criminals are getting bolder. Authorities report that some home break-ins  are being plotted like technical military operations. For some criminals, burglary has become their day job.

“Summertime we see a lot of these, this is nothing new,” said police Capt. Janice Rogers. “We attribute a lot of it to school being out and kids are out there breaking into houses. Basically, they are kicking in the door going after jewelry, money, electronics ... and firearms.”

Both agencies report that the overall number of break-ins were down through May when compared with 2008 statistics. Police data shows that homes in east and south Greensboro are hit more than other districts.

In the county, most break-ins are happening near Greensboro and High Point city limits. The majority take place during the day when no one is at home.

The sheriff’s office has reported 47 arrests related to home break-ins in the past 90 days. 

In September, the sheriff’s office cracked a large, sophisticated burglary ring that involved more than 50 people who hit numerous homes during the day. The group was accused in about 75 break-ins.

“To them it was a Monday through Friday business,” said Col. Randy Powers of the sheriff’s office. “They were getting out and scouting the homes they were going to hit in the early mornings and in the afternoon, teams would come out and break into the houses.”

Powers said some recent cases have involved suspects who knew exactly how long they had to ransack a home from the time they set off a burglar alarm to the time police would respond.

Authorities are taking a proactive approach to tackling burglaries, with increased patrols and community programs. The sheriff’s office is using a computerized program to chronicle similarities between break-ins to assist in developing suspects as a supplement to routine investigative work.

As for Cathy, some of the items she lost were recovered and warrants were issued for the arrest of the suspects who broke into her home. Her neighborhood, Hamilton Forest, has since started a community watch program to look out for one another in light of the burglary increase.

But the burglars took something from Cathy that will take a long time to recover — her peace of mind.

“It’s hard to feel safe and secure in your own home,” she said. “Everything was dead bolted and double-locked. ... You kind of think what else can you do?”

Contact Ryan Seals at 373-7077 or ryan.seals@news-record.com