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<p>If you’re walking to your dorm room, and four guys in masks are following you, there are two things you can do: 1) try to get into your room and lock the door before they can get to you. It’s unlikely that they’ll try to break in the door since that will bring too much attention to them. 2) keep walking past your room and try to find a public space. They might still rob you, but if you’re in a public place, they’ll want to rob you quickly and move on (basically take your wallet). And even if they wanted to hang around, good luck finding the room to steal the contents. We don’t know his situation to know if it was smarter for this person to try for 1) or 2). But either way, in that sort of situation, most people are primarily concerned about bodily harm and will tend towards putting a door between them and the suspicious people.</p>
<p>Also, you have to consider that he might not have seen them, especially if they came from around a corner or stairwell. They could have waited on him to open the door then walked in before his door could shut.</p>
<p>The real problem with that scenario is that the gates to that complex are one-at-a-time entry. Someone used their buzzcards to let those guys in the complex, and then in the building.</p>