Langley woman raises concerns about RCMP response to attempted B&E
Posted April 25, 2024 6:33 am.
Last Updated April 25, 2024 8:41 am.
A woman in Langley says she’s overcome with fear and anxiety after she says someone tried breaking into her home early Friday morning.
CityNews is not naming the woman or publishing whereabouts she lives. She shared surveillance footage with CityNews showing a man trying to enter through her ground-floor patio door.
Her son was asleep. She says it was about 4 a.m. when she heard the door handle, looked at her cameras, and saw the man. She goes on to explain she called 911 but says to her knowledge, an officer never arrived.
“After I talked to the [dispatcher], I got dressed and sat there with a baseball bat waiting for the police to come and kept my eye on the camera.”
When she looked at the image again, the man was gone, but she wasn’t sure if he had gone to a neighbouring home or was hiding.
“I listened and waited for the police to come, but no lights, no sirens, no police checking the area. Nothing. They didn’t buzz my door to be let in. They didn’t call me.”
She explains Friday afternoon, she called the detachment to voice her concerns and to learn what happened, but was told her file “was blank.”
“I said, ‘I know, because they didn’t show up.’ [The officer] said, ‘That’s really strange,’ and apologized.”
This woman, who says she’s currently on disability for anxiety, says this experience has made her condition so much worse. Admitting, she no longer sleeps until the sun comes up.
“It has been terrible. It’s one thing to feel unsafe because someone is trying to break in but the level of unease knowing that when I call 911, no one shows up, that’s just another level.
“I’m not a very high-maintenance person, but when I call 911, I would expect someone to show up.”
CityNews tried getting some answers from the RCMP earlier this week. She says late Tuesday morning, a member, who says he was dispatched following her 911 call on Friday, arrived at her home.
“He [said] he then got notified that the person who was trying to get into the door had left, so basically the call was de-escalated. He and his partner did a patrol in the area and closed the file at about 4:50 a.m. He said he didn’t call to let me know what was going on because he didn’t think I’d want a call waking me up at 5 a.m.”
She feels the officer only showed up because CityNews pushed for answers.
“Definitely, because he mentioned that I can go ahead with my complaint, so he definitely wasn’t here spontaneously. He was here because he knew I had been vocal about it.”
The Langley RCMP says it did dispatch a member, but it can’t elaborate on the officer’s actions once they arrived.
“The details on how we respond to a specific call form part of the investigative file. If anyone involved in an incident has questions or concerns with how their situation has been handled or investigated, they should contact police management directly. Alternatively, they can go through the Public Complaint Commission,” said Corp. Craig van Herk.
The woman says this incident has forced her to consider moving.
“I’m trying to see if I can get an apartment on a second or third floor, but then of course, the prices go up and I’d have to pay to move and that’s just not feasible for me. I’m very stressed.”
