I live downtown, so I've grown accustomed to simply tuning out normal alarms, but every couple of weeks one of these hair-trigger alarm-having assholes will park on my block, an eventually even I start to notice. These are narrow, heavily trafficked streets, and those things go off whenever anything goes by.
The worst of these was a couple of months ago now. The goddamned thing finally penetrated my consciousness at about 8:00PM. It would go for about 10 minutes, then stop until the next car drove by and start up again. This was still going on when I finally went to sleep at 2ish. And it was still going when I got up at 9. However, this apparently killed the battery because it was down to a sad whine and finally stopped as I left for work at 10.
When I went outside that morning, the car was covered with increasingly aggressive notes. And some dog shit. Which had also been smeared on the door handles. There was also a guy sitting on his stoop who said he was going to stand vigil to make sure no one gave this dipshit a jump. I bought that dude a coffee.
Nah, that's why they invented 9-1-1. Dial that and they ticket the owner for disturbing the peace. Or if you're feeling really strong, once the car is tilted approximately 30 degrees (towing position) the mercury switch on the alarm will shut itself off. THEN try hammer if that doesn't work...
Nope. At least in my city, there's nothing the cops can do. Car alarms do not fall under disturbing the peace. I know this because I had an extended conversation with a police officer who lives in the neighborhood who was staking out an offending car to "talk" to the owner. There was nothing he could do officially.
This is why car alarms are worthless now. You could probably actually break into a car, have the alarm go off and still take your sweet time combing through the car while the alarm is blaring and everyone will ignore it.
Seriously. With some of these cars, I would actively cheer anyone on who did break in.