do you live where its cold in winter? if so replace the single panes with custom double pane units (we did this on our victorian front door) and they are much more of an effort to break into (and thieves prefer easy targets) and give you some good insulation.

on same topic, the seal between the top and bottom of the door is important too. we get snow in our front hall during nor'easters but at least its only coming in under the door, not between the top and bottom too.

thank you all!

we live in LA where we're suffering a terrible drought-- so not only do we not get snow, we barely get rain :(

any other ideas out there for security?

Locks keep honest people out. The truly determined dishonest person will get in despite your efforts.

have you considered adding a deadbolt to the door in a low position on the door? It becomes much more difficult to turn a knee level latch on a door when reaching through a waist high window. Additionally, that door becomes much more difficult to force when there are two latching points far apart.

I have seen various versions of slide bolts on my travels. Some of them are separate items either individually or placed one at the top and the bottom of the door. I have also seen one that was a three pronged lock where the user turned a knob which slid rods into spaces in the jab at the top, bottom and side of the door.

My french doors have heavy brass levers top and bottom which must be completely unlatched for the door to open. If the level is just pushed partway, it is heavy enough to fall back into closed position. A similar mechanism is a self closing gate latch. Both of those systems are only for doors which are used for exits since there isn't an exterior key.

I agree with the people who say a determined (and smart) thief won't even bother with your door. I worried a bit at first when we removed the wood panel, in our front door, that had been put in place of the large piece of glass that was meant to be there and put back beveled glass, but I realized relatively quick that it would be silly to try to break what is a pretty thick, heavy piece of glass when there's a regular window just to the side of the porch... not to mention ground level windows in the back of the house that would offer a much more private setting for breaking and entering. As we hadn't had a problem before putting glass back in the door, why should I think that just the door would change it?

Security system with a glass break monitor on it should help. Someone breaks the glass, alarm goes off. Other than that, deadbolt top and locking knob on bottom.

Love Dutch doors. We used them for our kids rooms when they were little.