ADT Alarm Failure Deadly in Minnesota, Leads to ADT Settlement
October 3rd, 2011. By AbiK
Who ya gonna call? Well, if you’ve had an ADT alarm system installed, you’re proababy thinking you don’t need to call anyone if someone should break into your home. After all, ADT is supposed to be right on it, detecting a break-in and alerting the police who should then get to your home more quickly than if you had detected the break-in yourself and tried to dial 911.
Right?
Unfortunately, a for a couple in Minnesota, things didn’t turn out that way. Their ADT alarm system failed—when they needed it most.
In 2006, Teri Lee had been afraid that her ex-boyfriend, Steven Van Keuren, might cause trouble—he’s the reason why she purchased an ADT system for her home. Sadly, Lee’s worst fears came true when Van Keuren entered Lee’s home and shot both her and her new boyfriend, Timothy Hawkinson. Both Lee and Hawkinson died.
Lee’s estate filed a lawsuit against ADT, and recently reached a confidential settlement.
Loss of life by murder is surely what we’d hope would be a freak accident as the alleged result of an alarm system failure. But it’s not all that far out there to envision, is it?… A break-in happens…should be your run-of-the-mill burglary…maybe the thief is looking for some jewelry, or cash…but maybe he finds the homeowner instead…unexpectedly. The outcome could be all the same—death—except legally we just call it different things…it’s a matter of degrees.
But what if it could’ve been prevented? What if there were a reasonable expectation—heck, a contractual expectation—that an installed alarm system should function properly and the would-be victim were still alive? No alarm system that touts itself as your security blanket and knight in shining armor should fail in your hour of need.
Over the past year and a half, LawyersandSettlements.com has received a number of complaints from individuals stating that their ADT alarm systems failed—or that the ADT response time was inadequate. Thankfully, they are all alive to tell their stories.
And, if we go back to 2007, there actually had been a lawsuit filed against ADT alleging slow response times—and it was seeking class action status.
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I agree that the response time is clearly inadequate. I have an ADT system and on several occasions it has been (inadvertently) triggered when no one was home. ADT's response is to first call me and confirm it was not an accident. If I don't answer they call my wife. If she doesn't answer they call her mother. ADT makes three phone calls before it alerts the police. From the time the alarm is first triggered until the police are actually notified is at least five minutes and probably closer to 10. Not exactly the responsiveness I thought I was getting.
Untrue. Don't lie on this page, it cheapens the profession. If ADT called 3 numbers first, YOU have YOUR contract stated to do so. ADT policy is to call the house 1st. If there is no answer they dispatch the police..THEN call your cell phones and the rest of your emergency contact list. If YOU never set your contact list to that effect, its not ADT's fault. Its user error. (as in YOU) On the emergency contact section of the contract or your customer home page you can change all that and clearly you should since you didn't feel the need to read it in the first place. This is not ADT's fault its yours. House should be set to BEFORE POLICE and the rest of your contacts need to be set for AFTER POLICE simply as a notification of an event.
Too funny!….with all the ruffled feathers YOU (lol…Jim) must be a ADT rep. I don't think that Eric was cheapening the profession as the truely knowdable don't work at ADT. Thanks again for the laugh!! YOU!!! lol
Jim wake up and smell the coffee! You must be An ADT worker.Response time for alarm is 5 to 10 minutes and you don't get a call.When you do call them and ask "Why did you not call"? you get iam sorry mam.Well sorry isnt what i paid for . Ihave a feeling that they have routers to other states and that is why the response time is nill.They can't even answe questions like, " is it a flaw in your system'? "is it your equiptment'? "are the people in the monitor room there, are they outside smokeing, are they in the lunch room"? dead silence. As of 2012 they have 568 complaints, and lost a case in MN when a women was murdered.In my opnion they are a detrament to anyone that uses them.
Sorry Jim… You’re quite a bit inaccurate stating they call the house 1st, then they dispatch police… Here’s the actual documented procedure… upon Activated Alarm… Call placed to Customer… Wait for an answer; if Customer answers, and someone is holding a gun to their head, they are going to say “It’s a false alarm”… Next Day, Headline News will read of B&E or worse, Homicide; if Actual Alarm, where no one answers, ADT’s Security Call Center Phones 911 as the First Responder… 911 must then Identify the local Dispatch Center over Victims District… and FINALLY a call is placed to the Local Dispatch to respond to the original Security Center Alarm Call!! That’s plenty of time for nothing good to happen. ADT DOES NOT DISPATCH POLICE… EVER!!! Their Policy is to call the Customer’s 911 Regional Call Center, who then figures out what Dispatch to send to the Crime Scene… Too Late. ADT is an Antiquated Dinosaur!
You need to check out covertwifi.com. they’re a “Pro-Active” Offensive Security Company… Slogan “Be Defensive… Go on the Offense!” Now THEY have it worked out to the customers benefit and no stupid contracts. Sorry You’re still in the Industrial Age which ended in the late 80’s with ADT still taking the Defensive Approach to Defense Whereas Covert WiFi Surveillance takes the Offensive approach to Defense… catch’em while they’re outside thinking about it!!
No actually he is not lying.
My alarm just went off and no call at all.
Dont worry piece of trash ADT I will be leaving you soon and suing for my money back.
That was truly an ADT rep that is butt hurt
Eric you need to come to vivint, I work for them you will love vivint . Our response time is 7.2 seconds to any emergency we respond to the emergency
All comments seem to come from ADT and the competition,
My ADT alarm system was activated yesterday. ADT was unable to reach myself or my husband for over an hr(they left messages). When we returned their call (we had both been in meetings) it was over an hour later. ADT told us that they could not reach the police department!! So…. My home alarm had been going off for an hr, they couldn’t reach us or the police- and yet no further action occurred. I demanded to know which number they had attempted to call (which they initially told me was illegal), to find out that they were not even calling the right police department. It is VERY scary to see how unconcerned and undependable they were!
We have over 6.5 million customers and accidents do happen. However The customer chooses if and how many people are called before the police. Our system may have failed and there may have been extenuating circumstances. Yesterday I visited one of our SIX North American monitoring centers each employes over 400 operators. Our response time is under 6 seconds for first call to the customers first number on the customers predetermined call list. If they have chosen to have us call them or several others before police that's their choice. The Second largest Security company is Vivant they have only two monitoring centers. Most security company's have only one with a very small amount of operators.
How do you work it when the police AHJ mandates the central station makes 2, 3 or calls the entire list before dispatching police? Do you still allow the client to say they only want 1 number called before dispatching?
I was doing some research on ADT when I came across this, two days ago my husband and I were both at work, my 17 yr old daughter was home alone. She is upstairs and hears a loud noise and comes down stairs and locked the front door, on her way back upstairs she set our ADT alarm. Within 2 minutes someone kicked in our front door, my daughter barricaded herself in her bedroom and called me at work. It so happens I work for 911 but in another county. So I transferred her to the right agency and they got police to my house, this took a total of 10 min. Once police arrived at my home my front door was opened and whoever it was thankfully had got scared off by the alarm. But what I found out later was that ADT called the police department 2 times and couldnt get through so they cancelled the alarm. They sent NO ONE!! Had the intruder harmed my daughter I wouldnt have known until I got home after work. I feel like I trusted ADT with the lives of my kids while I am 45 min away and they failed me. How am I ever gonna trust that if this happens again that they are gonna send help. My faith in ADT is completely broken. I just am so thankful my daughter didnt get harmed or killed.
I can say for sure that ADT does not call the police where I live. We had an attempted breakin while we were home. The alarm triggered and heard the intruder trying to come in the window. ADT did call us, and asked if everything was ok. I said no, someone is trying to break in to our home and I have a firearm ready. They had asked if we wanted them to send someone, and I said yes. They sent their armed patrol about 20 minutes later and did not call the police. I had called all the way up the corporate ladder and was advised that if I need the police, it would be in my best interest to call them. They also had advised that they must send their patrol first to confirm the events prior to sending the police. Not a good situation, and I feel ADT had failed.
A huge part of the criminals and vandals may use.
Why else are surveillance systems less helpful than just a few years.
Spy cameras are mostly used for watching closely on nannies, their businesses through live streaming on your
budget why should you just can t afford the price difference will rely upon the memory card.
I had ADT for nearly 4 years. In that time, the monitoring rates increased while the service decreased. During the first year I had the service, my cat tripped the alarm twice (we removed that sensor after that), both times, when ADT called (prior to switching to rob-calling) I was NOT asked for my secret word. After the first year, when the alarm was tripped and then a code put in within 5 minutes – we would get a robo-call saying “we received an alert that your alarm was triggered but since a code was put in within minutes, the police will not be called”. Ok, so if I was at gunpoint, the could-be killer was just told “the police will NOT be called, have fun!” This was NOT what I signed up for. Robo-calls should NOT be a part of any security system! The icing on the cake, that led us to quit ADT and seek another service….was when a fire alarm (smoke detector) malfunctioned when we were not home, we got home and the alarm was blasting, not sure if it was the connection to the batteries or the batteries themselves, but my husband cleaned the connection and put in new batteries and tested it afterwards and it was working fine again…. but ADT didn’t call us that day, nor did they call the fire department……they did call us THREE DAYS LATER to tell us that our fire alarm had been triggered. At that point, I told them what they could do with their service as I had already gotten a new provider and system because their service was worthless!
Our alarm went off for about 5 minutes at 4 am and no one called. No one. We are calling them because this is unacceptable.
My house got broken in on the Aug 24, 2017 while the alarm was set on as “Arm Away”.
I have 1 indoor camera, 2 motion sensors, 1 glass break detector, and other window sensors on all windows and doors. NONE OF THEM TRIGGERED. All that time the burglars were breaking in, and to steal all of my belongings, no damn alarm triggered.
I called ADT while I had police and detectives dispatched in my house, asked ADT if they see anything in their system. Of course they don’t see anything as I didn’t see anything in my alarm activity list. How is this possible? ADT does not have an answer for me. All they said was sorry. Per their contract, ADT only cover upto $500 for your insurance deductible under Theft Protection Plan. But that is only when their whatever department approves. I called to stop the service, and they said I need to give 30day notice. They must be just out of their mind!!!!!!