SEGUIN, Texas – It's a strange thing to see someone else opening up your car, especially when it's a law enforcement member on the front page of the local paper.
Heather Parker was surprised to find a picture in the Seguin Gazette of a Guadalupe County Sheriff's Office investigator standing by her car with the driver's side door open under the headline, "Easy Holiday Targets." It was an article about law enforcement writing notes to owners of unsecured vehicles to warn them they could be victims of burglars.
But Parker said she never saw the note and had no idea the investigator had been in her car until she saw it in the Gazette.
"I know they didn't have a warrant, and they didn't have my permission because I didn't know about it until last night," Parker said.
Parker said her window was left open because it's broken. Both the article in the Gazette and the Sheriff's Office said her door was unlocked, too, though Parker said she had locked it.
In any case, the photo in the paper clearly shows the door was opened.
"Is it something that we're encouraging our officer to do? Absolutely not. Is it something that's been addressed with that officer and supervisor? It absolutely has," said Sheriff's Office Investigator Wayne Lehman.
Lehman said the investigator in the photo was writing the notes to car owners as a member of the County Sheriff's Combined Auto Theft Task Force. The notes are fine, he said. Opening the door? Not so much.
"I don't know what the task force policy is but I know that our policy is to leave the vehicle status quo," Lehman said.
Parker said she and her fiance had deliberately parked by two marked Sheriff's Office cars. Now they're worried someone will recognize their car and think it's an easy target.
"I parked there because I thought it was going to protect me when, in fact, it hurt me a lot," Parker said.
Lehman said he doesn't believe the investigator was being malicious.
"I think honestly his heart was in the right spot, and he was trying to do the right thing," Lehman said.
Parker and her fiance were upset about their car's photo being shown in the Seguin Gazette as well. Publisher Jeff Fowler told KSAT 12 over the phone on Wednesday that it was a news story and the photo of the car was pretty "non-descript."