Vancouver family speaks out after tire slashing

Someone keeps slashing a Vancouver family’s car tires – and Monika Gul finds they don’t know who it is or why they’re doing it.

By Monika Gul and James Paracy

Posted January 9, 2023 9:14 pm.

Last Updated January 10, 2023 7:30 am.

Someone keeps slashing a Vancouver family’s car tires, and they don’t know who is doing it or why it keeps happening.

Shannon, who doesn’t want her last name released for safety reasons, says this whole process hasn’t been a comfortable one.

“Just knowing that there’s a person with a knife who’s watching our driveway every night, it’s really disconcerting,” she said.

Since October, the family has dealt with 11 tires slashed in six different incidents in their neighborhood. Shannon says the first four incidents happened in October. Each time, a tire on Shannon’s car as well as a one on her husband’s car have been slashed.

She tells CityNews no one else in the area seemed to be targeted. The repeated acts prompted them to install cameras overlooking their driveway, which caught some of the incidents.

The suspected tire slasher is shown through black and white camera footage. He appears to be running away from the scene.

The suspected tire slasher is still unidentified, even with camera footage being captured.

However, even with the camera footage, the identity of the person responsible remains an unsettling mystery.

“We’ve obviously been asked like 500 times by everybody, ‘What did you do? Who did you piss off, like what’s going on?’ We have racked our brains, there’s absolutely nothing obvious,” Shannon said.

The initial string of tire slashings prompted Shannon and her husband to explore different parking options.

“And then there was a seven-week period, like we hadn’t been parking at home, and one night I fell asleep and forgot to move my car in time and that very night he slashed my tires again so that was probably the most disconcerting, cause it’s like, ‘Okay, somebody is watching our driveway and watching our movements,’ and that felt really bad,” she explained.

The couple continued to park away from their home but on Saturday morning, Shannon says her husband’s car was once again found with two slashed tires.

“Now we’re in the situation of, cool, he’s finding our vehicles out in the neighborhood as well or seeking them out. So, now I’m like, I don’t know where to park.”

This problem has proven to be a costly one for the couple. Shannon says after the most recently slashed tires are replaced, the couple will be out about $3,300 plus roughly $500 for the cameras and flood lights. She says ICBC hasn’t covered a tire.

“They’re like the same price as our deductible, essentially, and I tried, you know, ‘Could you lump a couple of incidents into one, some of them are only a couple days apart?’ And they’re like ‘nope’ and then they just actually told me that I needed to stop calling and reporting because my vehicle would be flagged as high risk and then my rates would go up.”

ICBC tells CityNews Shannon may have misunderstood claims staff when they discussed whether to formally submit a comprehensive insurance claim for damaged tires. It confirms a $300 deductible applies for each incident of vandalism, which is what a slashed tire is considered.

Meanwhile, the Vancouver Police Department says it’s investigating, but so far no suspect has been identified.

“We’ve done some safety planning, we know that they have cameras in the area, we’ve increased our patrols in the area, the officers who work in that neighborhood are aware of this and we’ve asked them to pay extra attention to that neighborhood. We’ve also had the opportunity to leave a police vehicle in the area, which acts as a decoy,” Sgt. Steve Addison said.

Shannon says she’s thankful for the support the couple has been getting through a GoFundMe page they set up to help cover some of their costs.

As for her message to the person behind the tire slashings, she says she just wants this to come to an end.

“We feel really confused and scared and I would just say if it’s some kind of help that you need, I hope that you can find that and just stop hurting our family,” she said.