OVERLAND PARK, Kan. — He’s dressed in white from head to toe, apparently covering his face so no one recognizes him.
That’s what people in several south Overland Park neighborhoods found on their home surveillance videos this week.
Folks in the Summerwood Estates, Polo Fields and Mills Farm neighborhoods aren’t used to a lot of criminal activity. So when somebody started stalking the neighborhoods, it alarmed a lot of people.
“That`s creepy,” Officer John Lacy said when he watched the videos collected on doorbell cameras. “The first thing I thought is it’s really creepy and why would someone walk around in a hazmat suit?”
More specifically, someone wearing a hazmat suit with his face covered, a miner’s light on his head and wearing a backpack and gloves. He’s walking up to homes and around backyards in southern Overland Park.
One woman, who didn’t want to be identified, said she heard her doorbell camera alarm go off around midnight.
“Because we have a new puppy and lots of kids in and out. So I didn’t think too much of it,” she said. “But when I got up and checked Facebook, I had all sort of neighbors posting videos, and I thought, ‘Well that is kind of odd.'”
When she checked her video, the woman said, “It was the same strange, creepy person who had started to come to the front porch.”
The creeper actually went into another woman’s screened in porch.
“When we woke up Tuesday morning, we noticed the door was opened, and we noticed the latch was just (locked open) like that,” she said.
When she heard about what happened from neighbors on Facebook, it dawned on her the guy may have also tried to get in another way.
“Monday night, when all of this went on supposedly, my husband got up and heard something tapping, and he went downstairs,” she said.
After checking, the couple found a shattered basement window.
“Last night, we went and bought a doorbell camera and cameras for the front and the back, so my husband is going to install them this weekend,” she said. “We are loaded up, and we also have a security system in the house.”
Overland Park police say not to confront the man but call 911 immediately if you see any suspicious activity.
If you have any information about who this creeper could be, call the Overland Park Police Department or the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS.