It’s one thing to be told that you’ve been robbed or discover it on your own.
It’s quite another to watch it all unfold on video, said one Saanich resident whose building’s underground parkade was ransacked by a thief recently.
“Residents watched in horror as this thief casually rode a bike around the parkade and robbed us,” said the resident, who wanted their identity protected. “It was all captured on surveillance video. That really hurts.”
The robbery happened at a building in the 3200 block of Rutledge Street that has been hit by thieves multiple times, going as far back as 2018, according to Conway Carruthers, who supplied copies of the surveillance video to Black Press Media showing the thief riding a bicycle around the parkade.
Often, thieves get into secure parkades because residents don’t watch the gates as they drive in and out of the parkade.
“Sloppiness has been an issue in the past, but not this time,” said Carruthers. “(This time it was) brute force applied to the right spot on a door in the middle of the night.”
Apart from vehicle damage, many vehicles were “rummaged through” by the thief, said Carruthers.
Stolen items include an electric scooter.
“Saanich police say they believe the thief is a woman,” Carruthers said. “The previous day, a suspicious woman tampered with one of the cameras in visitor parking, but it is unclear if that was a coincidence:
Multiple vehicles are damaged, and many items are missing.”
The video footage has been supplied to Saanich police and an investigation is ongoing.
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