BY GREG SAKAKI
A north Nanaimo business is closed and waiting for a mason to arrive after a thief or thieves tried to cut through the side of the building last night.
The break-in attempt happened about overnight Monday or Tuesday, Aug. 21-22, at Deals 4 You thrift and consignment store on Metral Drive.
“They decided to take out a portion of the wall. They’d measured where the safe was…” said Jeff Ross, the store owner. “They didn’t actually gain entry to the store, thankfully, but it’s still unnerving that they can come through a wall.”
Ross, who also owns Gold Silver Guy stores on the central Island, had experienced 19 break-ins over the years at his businesses.
“This makes No. 20. It’s just so frustrating as an individual, as a business,” he said. “At my age, at 63, I tell you, if I didn’t love what I do, I’d quit.”
Ross lost $62,000 worth of merchandise in a break-and-enter at the Gold Silver Guy store on Nanaimo’s Townsite Road in January, and had a break-in at the Duncan location last month, even though, as he said, he’s got “layers” of security measures at his businesses.
“It’s $10,000 to put a roll-up shutter in my store in Duncan,” he said. “But that won’t help you when they come in through a side wall.”
He hasn’t been able to buy insurance in approximately 10 years, he said, as his policy kept going up and eventually he was cut off entirely.
He said it was a person experiencing homelessness who broke into his Duncan store, but with no video surveillance on that outside wall at Deals 4 You, he doesn’t have any idea who cut through his wall.
“Crime is certainly rampant and it comes right down to the courts, if you ask me the truth. There’s no deterrent,” Ross said. “I was taught, if it’s not yours, you don’t touch it.”
Reserve Const. Gary O’Brien, Nanaimo RCMP spokesperson, said it appears a suspect or suspects used a cordless grinder to cut through the wall. Police say the alarm was activated at 1:30 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 22, though Ross thinks there was a delay in the alarm notification and that the break-in attempt actually happened at about 9:30 p.m. Monday, Aug. 21.
O’Brien said the crime would have been noisy and might have attracted suspicion from nearby residents or passersby.
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