CHICAGO: Retirement communities and skilled nursing homes imply a level of elevated safety in their commercial pitch to prospective customers.
But evidence is mounting that age-apartheid compounds are increasingly becoming soft crime targets and the care sector is trashing its reputation by doing nothing to effectively counter the growing threat:
185. Burglars have stolen gold jewellery from an elderly couple.
The first of the crooks led the home owner in his 80s into the kitchen of his property to check for a leak, ignoring his requests for identification.
He then asked the pensioner to put the kettle on while two accomplices went upstairs, one of which led the man’s wife downstairs.
When the couple’s 35-year-old daughter came to visit and confronted the men, the last of the three came running downstairs with his hands full of the jewellery and cash before the gang decamped…