1 Short Story Fiction The Video Doorbell Nightmare

1. 1 Short Story Fiction

The Video Doorbell Nightmare

While in the kitchen preparing dinner, for her two children, on a Fall evening of October, there was a knock on the door, Lucy Aristide (Ari-steed) answers, “who is it?”  “Joseph,” a male voice replied.   She proceeds to open the door, and is greeted by a tall slender build male, who came to inform her that property management, wants her and other tenants to remove their video doorbells from their doors, citing invasion of privacy issues.  She complied and removed the device from her door, Joseph responds, “thank you” and heads towards the elevator, as she slowly closes the door.

She thought to herself, “why does property management now wants video doorbells banned from the building, due to invasion of privacy issues; when before they were ok with us having doorbell cameras?”  Lucy later learned, that due to a tragic event that took place on the third floor, over a video doorbell camera, that prompted property management to issue a ban on these devices.

                                         BACKGROUND STORY

In the year 2022, a neighbor who lived on the 3^rd floor of an apartment building on 258 Elmsford Street. A neighbor, who goes by the name, Elsa Green owned a wireless Ring video doorbell camera incased in an anti-theft (non-drilling) doorbell bracket, attached to her door.

Elsa, described as biracial, medium height and overweight; she worked part-time as a data entry operator for a small non-profit organization in Baltimore, Maryland. She lived alone and doesn’t have any visitors unless they were family members. She had two children, but they lived with their maternal grandmother, it was alleged that she had little contact with her children due to reasons unknown.

July 5, 2022, an incident took place, when a couple, Aaron Brown, and Antonia Rodriguez whose apartment door faced Elsa’s door equipped with the doorbell camera seven feet apart, decided to take their complaint to property management about their privacy presumably, invaded by her; since her doorbell camera not only captures them entering and exiting their apartment, but also fully captured as to what was inside of their apartment.  The motivation for their actions, is Antonia always picked up bad vibes from Elsa, it was something sinister and creepy about her and her intuition picked up on it.  

Once investigation of their complaint was completed, Elsa received both a letter and later a visit from the super, of the building who is from property management, brusquely ordered that she take down her video doorbell camera, citing complaints of invasion of privacy. The livid Elsa tried to explain why she needed a video doorbell camera, for safety and security purposes.

But the super, Joseph Rivera, was not hearing any of it and ordered her to remove her doorbell camera or her lease would be terminated and would face eviction.  Elsa grudgingly complied, leaving her with no choice but to remove the doorbell from her door; her now enmity towards the couple would begin in an acrimonious dispute that would escalate into tenant warfare.

On several events Elsa, with that baleful energy, would act out her retaliation by committing atrocious acts against both Aaron and his partner, Antonia by making terroristic threats with the intent to assail the couple, she would loudly bang and kick on their door, screaming obscenities and would dump garbage at their door. One time she vandalized and broke into their mailbox and proceeded to steal their mail, in addition to stealing their packages; her reign of terror continued until tragedy struck.

When Elsa learned that both Aaron and Antonia, filed a police report against her for breaking into their mailbox and committing theft; she came to their door; armed with a meat cleaver.  She began banging and kicking on their door, as she screamed obscenities at them “OPEN THE DOOR BITCH!!”  Police arrived, and ordered Elsa to drop the weapon, she refused and continued on with her psychotic rants.  The police, with their guns drawn, ordered her again, to drop the weapon, but as unhinged, as she was, came towards them and shots were fired, hitting Elsa in the chest and torso.  Elsa dies on her way to the hospital, after unsuccessful attempts to revive her. 

It was later revealed that the now deceased, Elsa Green, had a history of violent behavior; including mental disorders, and was deemed mentally unstable and dangerous; by which, led to her life to be curtailed.  Elsa was one who was easily triggered when things didn’t work out in her favor or when she didn’t get her way.  She was one who couldn’t take losses, and would resort to threats, intimidation and perhaps, actual violence, whenever she found herself on the losing end.  This was the illustration of her actions, when she had to take down her video doorbell camera, after she been reported to the property manager  by the neighbors by which, made her snap.    

Aaron and Antonia never confronted the cantankerous and malevolent Elsa, about her video doorbell camera pointing directly at their door and for good reasons.  They had no idea as to how dangerous and unstable she was thereby, they decided to contact the property manager directly.  During the ongoing police investigation, the police detective ventured into the deceased’s apartment and recovered the video doorbell camera and her phone and took it to the forensics lab for processing. The police forensics team were able hack Elsa’s phone to access video footages and images captured from her Ring app, and it was when the police uncovered things, that were disturbing.

  While viewing the video footage and camera images from her Ring app, it was when the detectives found what was disturbing.  There were video images of Aaron and Antonia leaving and exiting the apartment, in addition, it showed clear view image captures and video footage of what their inside apartment looks like.  And if that weren’t enough, it also showed that she had recorded conversations between the couple, involving a conversation of their complaints of  her pointing her doorbell camera at their door and reporting her to property management. 

Was Elsa, in a clandestine way, using her doorbell camera to spy on Aaron and Antonia who live across the hall? Was she using the video doorbell camera for the wrong reasons?  It was later learned that Elsa, had gossiped about other tenants who live on other floors of the building, based on their conversations that took place in the hallways, that she covertly recorded with her Ring doorbell.

If it weren’t enough, it was also found, based on police investigation,  that she would upload and post incidents from her doorbell camera on social media for amusement at the victims’ expense. The atrocities of her actions reveal who she really is.  Someone who should be avoided at all costs, for she was in fact a dangerous person.

Concluding their investigation, Elsa had broken the law under The Invasion of Privacy Law and The Wiretap Act; had she been alive, she would’ve likely faced criminal charges that could get her sent away to prison.  The news of the police findings vindicated both Aaron and Antonia, after learning that they were victims of Elsa’s criminal act against them. The police has since closed the the investigation, while Aaron and Antonia has put their ordeals behind them now that their nightmare is over and has since be living peacefully thereafter.   No longer will they have to deal with another, demonic tenant who had bullied and terrorized them throughout sometime.

Epilogue

In wake of this recent tragedy, and the circumstances surrounding it, property management had since decided via notification  sent to tenants, to have their video doorbells removed from their doors.  In addition, they were invited to tenant and landlord townhall meetings to discuss what had transpired that lead to the ban of video doorbell cameras.  During the townhall discussion, property management announced that they will be installing their own video cameras throughout the building to help keep tenants safe.  However, there was a reason of wanting to install their own cameras. 

The reason for the landlords to wanting their own cameras installed in the building, is so that can be able control what they can capture and edit.  When tenants had their own doorbell cameras, landlords could not access or control what was being captured on their devices.  In relation to the matter, due to the Elsa Green Case the landlord (property management), now doesn’t want any of the tenants to be recording what goes on in the hallways; due to eavesdropping issues .  Working with law enforcement, the landlord, later installed video cameras; that can be accessible by both the landlord and police.  

 CONCLUSION

 Because of the Elsa Greene incident, and the circumstances surrounding it, landlord has permanently ban the use of video doorbell cameras by tenants; citing invasion of privacy and wiretapping laws.  Video doorbells can be used for the wrong reason, especially by those with bad intentions; such in the case of Elsa Green.  There’s very old saying “One Rotten Apple, Spoils The Barrel.” Because of one bad person, the everyone else could no longer have doorbell cameras on their doors; for it is not known what their intentions for having them are .  To prevent another Elsa Green incident from happening again, the  landlord has decided to permanently ban video doorbell cameras from their premises.