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By Rob Alway. Editor-in-Chief.
A post on Facebook suggesting that there are people going door to door posing as sales people and staking out homes to rob has gone viral. However, the people are actually real sales people, selling Kirby vacuums.
The post was made Saturday by Autumn Adamczak. It read:
ATTENTION EVERYONE IN MASON COUNTY ! There is two black males and a white male going to peoples houses holding bleach in there hands asking for the woman in the house. And trying to sell something. DO NOT let them in. They will try to enter you house to scope it out for a future robbery. Do not let them in just tell them to leave. They are riding around in a green mini van. And mason county sheriff’s are looking for them!. PLEASE SHARE!!!!
The post went viral with over 460 shares. Several people then contacted MCP.
“We do have a van in that area,” said a representative from the Kirby dealer in Mt. Pleasant. She added that one of the men is black, from St. Lucia. “Yesterday they had a green van but that is in for repairs so today’s van may be maroon. They do have appointments over in Mason County and to fill the other time they are knocking on doors.”
The owners of the Ludington Kirby dealership, John and Ann Barber, retired last year but still offer service and repairs at their South James Street shop.
“Years ago we sold that way but we stopped doing that,” John Barber said. “But, I can say that they are legitimate.”
The spokeswoman from the Mt. Pleasant store said that background checks are done on all sales people and non have criminal backgrounds.
Mason County Sheriff Kim Cole said his office hadn’t received any complaints until Tuesday night at 11 p.m.
“They haven’t done anything criminal,” Sheriff Cole said. “Our guys are looking into it today, however.”
A Free Soil Township woman who wished to not be identified said she was told the men were at her neighbor’s house.
“The thing that creeped us out was that the white man was told he could not come in and then he got down on his knees and begged to come in,” the woman said, adding that she actually had not witnessed the man at her neighbor’s house. “I find that strange a man on his knees begging to come in your house.”
The woman then said she called the Mt. Pleasant Kirby dealer as well. “I complained of the man begging and she (the woman at the dealership) assured me her salesman would not act that way, which they did. So I am sure that is why the community is on edge with this. The man acted to be on drugs.”
Some local municipalities, such as Scottville, have ordinances that require salesmen register with the city before going door to door.
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