A MOTHER’S worst nightmare became her reality last night in Puntan’s Hill when her home was nearly invaded by two armed suspects. Genevieve Cutts told Berea Mail the incident occurred around 7.30pm on Thursday.
“My husband was in the bath and I was putting my six-year-old son, Gabe to bed, when I heard a noise at the door. It was a loud bang like something hit our door which was quite unusual and my guard immediately went up,” she said.
When Genevieve looked out from an upstairs window to see what was going on, she noticed the driveway gates were half open. Nervous, she was about to go tell her husband in the bathroom that something was wrong and that he’d better go close the driveway gates, when she spotted two men banging at her glass kitchen door.
“One had a crowbar, the other one, I found out later had a gun. They were trying to get into the house. I think they thought that we were not home as the car was in the garage and it looked like the house could be empty. They saw me, but that didn’t deter them. When the first guy saw me he turned to make a getaway, but the other guy pushed him back toward the door,” she said.
Genevieve shouted at the men, alerting her husband to the fact that something was wrong. Her screams brought both her husband and son to where she was standing in the room.
When Genevieve’s husband, Warren, realised the men were not in the least concerned by their presence in the house, he instructed her to take their son and get out the house.
“I just grabbed my boy and ran down the stairs to the back sliding door and out through the garden, so we weren’t trapped in the house with them,” she said.
“All the while my child was screaming, ‘We are going to die mummy, they’re going to kill us.”
By the time Genevieve had got her son out the house, the alarm had been activated, but the two men kept up their efforts in trying to smash through the tempered glass door.
With the alarm blaring, and realising the security company would have been alerted, the men gave up and fled over the wall, just as Genevieve’s neighbour was returning home from a school concert with her young sons in the car.
The two men pulled the woman and her sons out the car and robbed them of their jewellery, phones and shoes and fled in her vehicle, leaving the two boys screaming in terror and their mother in a state of shock.
“We are lucky to live in a secure house, but the experience was surreal, it was like watching a movie, certainly the worst experience I’ve had as a mom. I’ve never felt more vulnerable and dis-empowered as my child’s protector. I don’t like to feed the fear and know this was an isolated incident, not the norm but everybody has the right to feel safe and that right was taken away from me last night,” said Genevieve.
“I’m looking forward to moving on and fully recovering from the trauma, with a few lessons learned. My son is okay but we are going to definitely look at trauma counselling. I consider ourselves very lucky and just hope that our experience helps others to be that more vigilant,” she added.
