By Pamela Singleton, Sonitrol Pacific Director of Communication
Posted July 16, 2009

Due to our vehement dedication to eliminating false alarms, extensive research follows any false activations we do have in the Operations Center. This summary of Leslie Malik’s, Sonitrol Pacific Portland Customer Service Representative, findings after an incident yesterday got me thinking … could it be ghosts?

Hi Joe,

I met the client at the location yesterday to follow up on the dispatch call you made early Wednesday morning. You may already know that this site is an antique “mall” with antique dealers leasing their own little stalls in a large building. I was lucky to catch the dealer whose stall was the source of the audio activation.

This dealer had purchased an antique armoire with glass doors and panes just a few days ago, real cheap she said. She said when she bought it she asked the seller why it was so cheap. The seller replied, “Because it’s bad luck”. Well the dealer didn’t think anything of it and set it up in her stall, adding some antiques on the inside glass shelves as a display. The glass crashing sound that activated the system was actually the lower inside glass shelf simply breaking, causing the contents inside to be pushed out the glass doors and onto the floor. The glass in the doors did not break out, just the inside glass. She said the odd thing is that the shelves were securely set and the antiques on it were simply a small lamp and vase. She also said the glass had no visible damage to it to cause it to break. Paired all this and the fact that it happened at 2am led her to wonder if there’s something paranormal going on or that this was just a fluke. Either way, I am sure she won’t mention the “bad luck” or the odd occurrence to the person who decides to purchase it!

The client was also very appreciative of your response to the glass breaking sounds, as there have been break-in issues in the past…

Leslie Malik | Customer Service Representative