Your letters

Staying safe

In your security package (June 2011), you advise not to advertise your vacation. Where I live, you can contact the sheriff’s office and ask for a “dark report” while you’re away, and an officer will cruise by your home every day to check on it.

Phil Schatz
Jacksonville, FL

Your article had some good tips on preventing home break-ins, but you didn’t mention the best one: Nothing deters thieves better than a dog.

Richard Massey
Memphis, TN

Your report on door locks didn’t mention “bumping,” when a crook creates a special key that can open locked doors. It’s easier than drilling or picking locks. Because bumping doesn’t leave obvious signs of break-in, some insurance companies assume you left your door unlocked. Your first concern for a new lock purchase should be resistance to bumping.

B.J. Herbison
Bolton, MA

Lock bumping isn’t necessarily easier than picking or drilling a lock. We think a high-security lock that performed well in our tests is the best type to buy.

Flying scared

For the airline industry, the operational environment becomes more complex daily (“Hidden Airline Dangers,” Viewpoint, June 2011). Safety should always be the No. 1 priority of any airline. I cannot understand how “farming out” your No. 1 priority would be acceptable to anyone. Professionalism and control will be diminished, and in the end safety and the public will suffer.

Steve Papaila
Dallas

Roth IRAs

I believe you’ve misled people concerning conversion to a Roth IRA by older persons (Ask Our Experts, June 2011). If you withdraw a required minimum distribution (RMD) and pay taxes, you cannot put that money into a Roth.

Joe Massa
Springboro, OH

We didn’t advise readers to take the RMD from the IRA and put it into a Roth, but to convert the IRA to a Roth. You’d pay taxes on what you convert without taking the RMD.

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