EVELLE THOMAS

Searching for a safe haven
Burglaries plague N.O. evacuee

Iris Cooper
Enterprise-Journal
Published Thursday, October 05, 2006 12:35 PM CDT

After surviving Hurricane Katrina and losing everything
in her New Orleans home to the killer storm, Evelle
Thomas didn’t think her life could get any worse.

It did.

Since evacuating to McComb, her Avenue D home has been
burglarized four times.

“I’m from the murder capital of the world, and I never
experienced anything like this,” Thomas said. “People
think New Orleans is bad. This place is bad.”

Thieves have taken clothes, shoes, jewelry, electronics
and other items that the family accumulated following the
storm.

“This is worse than Katrina,” Thomas said. “Katrina was a
godly thing. There was nothing that could have been done
to prevent it. What’s happening to me shouldn’t be happening.
This is senseless.”

Thomas, along with her children Tyrone Thomas, 14, Charles
Thomas, 12, Ronald Clayton, 7 and Evelle Thomas Dillion, 1,
came to McComb with just the clothes on their backs.

For nearly four months, they stayed in a motel room, all the
while searching for housing – and having little luck in a
rental market choked with people displaced by the storm.

“I may have been living in a hotel, but I was going to work
every day,” Thomas said. “I wanted to provide a stable
environment for my children.”

And she did, when she bought a house in east McComb.

On Dec. 12 – Tyrone’s 14th birthday – the family moved into
a six-bedroom, three-bathroom home on Avenue D, a far cry
from the cramped hotel room.

“I have a nice house, and I worked hard for it,” Thomas said.
“I don’t get welfare or child support. I earned this.”

In late May, nearly six months after the family moved in,
burglars kicked in the front door and stole a PlayStation
video game system and video games.

Intruders kicked in the front door again the first week of
August, about a week before school began, and took school
uniforms, tennis shoes and Tyrone’s new clothes.

She figures the bandits made off with more than $6,000 worth
of the family’s belongings.

Breaking the news to her children, who were excited about going
to school in a new city and meeting new friends, was devastating,
Thomas recalled.

“How do you explain to your children that they can’t go to school
because someone stole their clothes?” she said.

Burglars also took Thomas’ two-karat diamond engagement ring and
a safe containing about $400 in cash.

“I wouldn’t mind if they just stole my stuff. But these people
are stealing from my children,” she said. “What kind of person
would steal from someone who already lost everything? – It’s
wrong. It’s cold, and it’s heartless. I don’t see how they sleep
at night.”

Nearly a month after she reported the second break-in, Thomas
caught someone trying to break into her 2000 GMC Yukon. She was
en route to drop her daughter off at the babysitter so she could
report to work when she encountered the suspect.

Thomas, with baby Evelle Thomas in hand, exited the rear door of
the home around 4 a.m. on the morning of Sept. 16, and came
face-to-face with the burglar, who had smashed the rear window of
her SUV.

“I was devastated,” Thomas said. “I couldn’t go to work. I
couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t function.”

In late September, burglars kicked in two rear doors and entered
her home. Thomas hasn’t mustered up the strength to search for
missing items.

“I’m tired of being victimized,” she said. – I might as well
leave the door open. ... My head is hurting. My hair is falling
out, I’m just miserable.�

Thomas believes that her family is being targeted because they
are from New Orleans.

“I’m not raising thugs,” Thomas said. “My son made a perfect
score on the MCT... All my children are clean cut. They don’t
have gold teeth or tattoos.”

Thomas said she called the lieutenant governor, governor and
the attorney general’s offices for help.

“They told me that there was no help for evacuees in McComb,”
she said. “Everybody transferred me to somebody else. – Who do
you call for help when your house has been burglarized four
times?”

Thomas said the police officer who filed the last burglary
report told her that the McComb Police Department is short
staffed and overwhelmed in cases.

“I don’t care if there is one or 500 police officers on duty.
The reason for 911 is to protect and serve, and I don’t feel
like I’m being protected,” Thomas said.

Police Chief Billie Hughes said three officers have been hired
and are receiving training. Although the department is
understaffed Hughes said “that has not stopped us from doing our
job.”

In the wake of recent burglaries in East McComb, police patrol
has been beefed up in the area, and officers are keeping a close
eye on Thomas’ property, the chief said.

“We can’t post a guard on her house 24 hours a day,” Hughes said.
“We are doing everything we can to try to apprehend the individuals.
Hopefully we will be successful.”

There are no suspects in the burglaries, and officials are uncertain
if they are related to other break-ins in the area.

Hughes encourages residents to look out for each other’s property,
saying a close community network is the best defense for property
thefts.

“Don’t make it convenient for people to break into your home,”
he said. “Develop a relationship with your neighbors. They are the
first ones who would be able to spot someone that is not supposed to
be there.”