I usually write about crimes from an outside perspective, talking to victims or families and police officials, and it comes from a distance.

But this is an inside story, with gratitude for the extraordinary work of the police and a reminder of the importance of calling the police when something happens when it does.

We have a small dog, Riley, who usually doesn’t bark overnight unless the raccoon or opossum eats the cat food on the front porch again. And then, bark at the front door. But around 3:30 a.m. Wednesday, he was barking low, “indulgent” barks at the back door.

It’s not normal, so I took my phone and turned on the backyard camera.

It took me a second to realize that I was looking at a man coming out of the carport, between our cars.

“Jim, there’s a man coming out of our garage,” I said. Before I could call 9-1-1, my husband, a retired police officer, grabbed a heavy flashlight and walked out the front door with me right behind him.

We have a large butterfly bush at the bottom of our front steps on the sidewalk that connects to our driveway, which is actually one of Lexington’s historic driveways that runs between the streets. So the man coming down the driveway to our street didn’t see my husband until they were almost face to face.

“Can I help you?” said my husband, in a voice I recognized from his years as a police chief. By then I was on the phone with 9-1-1 telling them we had a burglary in progress.

The young man jumped when my husband spoke and took off running, and then we realized he had a partner coming from across the street who took off running at the same time.

I told the police which way they were going and Jim gave them a very detailed description.

And then I waited. I hate to admit that I was starting to get annoyed that they were taking so long to arrive. I should have been more patient because when the officer finally got around to talking to us he told us they had one in custody and a K9 unit on the other.

Of course they went in the direction I told them to see if I could find them first. And before long, they let us know they had both.

We were by no means the only victims of this pair that night going through our neighborhood looking for unlocked cars and taking whatever they could find. I don’t lock my Jeep because there’s no point, you can just unzip it, but I don’t leave anything of value in it either.

But others had property stolen, including financial items such as checkbooks and bank cards, and the two men were charged with seven counts of breaking and entering a motor vehicle along with first-degree burglary, which is not it is a petty crime.

Our local police chief said that these incidents have been happening lately, but the problem was that people would discover the theft the next day, and even though they had some dash cam footage, it wasn’t enough to make a full identification. So our call that night made all the difference.

But I say it was great police work. The officers made the right choices. Knowing we were safe, they chose to follow these two first while the trail was fresh. And it worked.

So many times, I’ve written about crimes only to be told by the police that no one talks, no one gives information, even when they know something. And it affects police efforts to solve crimes.

They just can’t do it alone. We have to help. As much as I understand that some have reason to distrust some police officers, we can’t expect them to solve crimes if we don’t share what we know.

I didn’t like getting into my jeep the next day. I could clearly see the fingerprint dust on the door and handle, but I didn’t mind that. He would open the doors and I could see how the thief had scattered my things so carelessly. All that was there was a jacket and a reusable grocery bag in the backseat, and in the glove compartment, my Jeep ducks, a few notebooks and pens for work, a bunch of tissues, and some candy wrappers that I hadn’t thrown out yet. . But they were thrown all over the car and it made me angry to think of someone else invading my space inside my beloved Jeep.

I’m glad they caught them, I’m glad for all of us who were broken, I’m glad we at least put an end to this little crime.

And I know I won’t all change my mind about making that phone call. But I would like to. Because the only way things will end well most of the time, the only way things will get better, is if we are willing to trust.

They did their job and they did it well this week. I am proud of the police department in my hometown of Lexington. We all should be.

Elisabeth Strillacci covers crimes, courts, Spencer, East Spencer and Kannapolis for the Salisbury Post.