Security for any structure is always done in layers, if its done right.
Motion detector lights will keep the wannabe's away from your home windows and doors, so they won't know who is home, or how to get in. PASS.
Interior lights on timers, TV and Radio, lights left on in bathrooms with exhaust fan left on all are Layers of indicators telling outsiders someone is inside the premises. PASS.
Firearms, Alarms- Inside and out-- are designed to scare the bejesus out of intruders, and to protect the occupants lives as a final Lethal Force Option. That means motion detectors inside the home, alarms on cabinets, safes, drawers, etc. Layers of defenses so that if some of the layers are found and defeated, they run into the next layer which catches them. Flashing lights, like strobe lights for cameras, are good because the first thought the intruder will have is that his picture is being taken. Putting cameras inside the house, and to cover entrances is a fine security set-up particularly if an alarm company service is hired to monitor those cameras when you are gone.
We had a gun rack built one time with a vertical dowel rod- or at least it looked like a 1/2" diameter dowel rod, set though the top of the rack, and down through the bottom, where is was padlocked inside the locked ammo box. The innocents and pathetically weak looking dowel was actually a wooden cover to a hardened steel rod inside it, that would foil most any attempt to cut it, to get to the guns on the rack. I still like that idea on open cases, and racks.
99% of homes will be safe from burglars simply by attending to outside lighting. Another .9" will be safe if inside/outside alarms are installed, camera are in place, and timers are used to make the home looked occupied. Inside camera, and LOUD alarms inside and out with flashing lights, will have the bad guys running for the hills empty handed if valuable are being kept under lock and key, with appropriate alarms installed.
In the six years I worked for the Public Defender's office, and in all the 37 years I have practiced law, we have had ONE Armed Robbery committed in the County by an organized gang of jewelry store bandits. They were caught 60 miles away at a motel in Bloomington, Illinois after pulling a robbery there. Of the people involved, ONLY the oldest, an ex-con with a substantial criminal history( ie. Rap Sheet), knew anything about precious gems, or how to convert jewelry into cash. The young guys he hired to actually do the robberies were simply too lazy( His assessment) to learn his " trade". He told my wife, another lawyer, that his was a dying trade, because all the young guys wanted to shoot up places, smash and grab. They simply would not use their brains to learn about precious gems, so that the fences did not rip them off on the stones.
We have had bank robbers come through the county, and rob banks, here, only to find out that they have been pulling bank robberies in other states. But, we have had a high success rate in solving those cases, either with arrests at the scene, or by locating evidence that lead to the identification and conviction of the suspects, after they were caught elsewhere. There is Nothing about the Bank Robbers we have seen here that is anything you don't see watching the cops and robbers TV shows. Most are very unsophisticated- getting very little money for the amount of time they face when convicted in Federal Court.
