Low-Energy Intruder Hangs Out in a High-Tech Home

http://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/05/nyregion/intruder-brooklyn-apartment.html

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The person who entered the apartment was not the one who was expected there, and as of that moment in February, a modern, Brooklyn version of “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” played out over a night and a day, the cold porridge and broken chair replaced by fast Wi-Fi and weed.

Once upon a time, a 26-year-old software developer named Sam moved into an apartment in Williamsburg. That was about four months ago. He was traveling in Argentina on business in February, so he joined what has become a cottage industry in New York City, listing his home on a website for short-term rentals.

On Feb. 22, he was contacted by a potential client: Meg from California, who wanted the place that very night. Short notice, but Sam, who asked that his last name be withheld because he was the victim of a crime, agreed for one reason.

“She had excellent reviews,” Sam recalled last week by telephone from Argentina. He quoted one: “Meg leaves the place cleaner than when she found it.” So he agreed and explained where Meg could find the keys.

Sam keeps a motion-activated camera in his apartment trained on his front door when he is away. It is not hidden, and he said he told guests about it upfront, and invited them to unplug it if they wanted. It is one of several gadgets he owns, along with an Amazon Echo, the voice-controlled speaker and personal assistant.

Hours after his exchanges with Meg, he received a picture sent by the camera, taken moments earlier. It showed a man, alone, entering the apartment with a duffel bag.

Suspicious, Sam texted Meg: “Were you able to get in?”

Came the reply: “Yes, Sam,” he recalled. “We already feel at home. LOL.”

Sam was skeptical — “I thought it was strange that he was speaking as though another person was with him,” he said — but he let it go.

All was quiet for a few hours. Then Sam received another alert from his camera, this one regarding its air-quality monitor, which detected an airborne foreign substance.

“This guy is smoking weed,” Sam said.

At about the same time, Sam received yet another alert, from Amazon, seeking verification of his recent spoken-command purchase using the Echo — an iPhone 7.

Sam texted: “Why are you ordering an iPhone on my credit card?”

According to Sam, the man replied: “Sorry, I was just curious.” Sam gained access to the camera feed. “He was just doing weird stuff,” he said. “Walking around naked.” The man noticed the camera and turned it toward the wall, and, a while later, turned it back.

Sam pulled up Meg’s account information, he said, and noticed a cellphone number he had not seen before. He called, and Meg herself answered. He explained the situation.

She looked at her account and saw trouble, Sam said. She told him that someone had used her account to book a recent string of back-to-back stays in apartments, and the apartment owners had reported damage, Sam said. Any negative feedback they may have written had not yet appeared.

“You should call 911,” Meg told him. “I have no idea who is in your apartment.”

Sam found he could not call 911 from Argentina, so he called his local police precinct in Greenpoint. It was around 2 a.m. on Feb. 23 in Brooklyn, and the officer who answered said there was nothing she could do, Sam recalled.

“A renter needs to be physically present to report a break-in,” Sam said he had been told. (The police said last week that at that time, any dispute sounded civil in nature, and not criminal, because Sam had agreed to rent out his home.)

In Williamsburg, the man was tucking himself in for the night, his sole companion Alexa, the name of the Echo’s virtual assistant, who records every command that comes her way.

“He turned off the music, turned off the lights,” Sam said. “He asked Alexa for a bedtime story.”

Sorry, Alexa replied. I don’t have any audiobooks in Sam’s library right now.

In Argentina and feeling helpless, Sam turned to Facebook.

“Someone broke into my apartment last night and is sleeping in my bed right now (creepy),” Sam wrote.

His friends responded: “OMG.” “Sorry this is happening bro.” One offered to go to the building, call 911 and report an intruder.

The next morning, the man awoke and, according to Sam, threw all his clothes in the washing machine. He took a picture of the gloomy scene out a window, the skyline shrouded in fog, and posted it on his own Facebook page. “This weather,” it read in part, with no indication of where he was.

Sam’s friend arrived and called the police. Sam, about 5,500 miles away, watched his camera as officers arrived.

“They opened the door and had their guns out,” he said.

The officers arrested the man in the apartment, and Sam posted a photo of him leaving in handcuffs. The police identified him as Amir Lewis, 21, of Crown Heights, Brooklyn. He was charged with burglary and trespassing. His lawyer declined to comment on Thursday.

Sam returned to the country and his apartment on Friday and discovered a final indignity in the kitchen, one that would have been familiar to those three bears.

“He baked a pizza,” Sam said. “He cleaned out my fridge and freezer.”

The End.