Until Thursday, Dustin Hamilton was only allowed to drive his girlfriend to and from work. Now, he can drive himself to the hospital and to court appearances. However, he is still prohibited from listening to music when he does so, at least in Central Saanich. He has received around 17 noise complaints from neighbours, and he has now facing criminal mischief charges for excessive noise.
Hamilton, 24, said he has no criminal history until this point, and that the trouble started when he was followed from Brentwood to Saanichton over the summer.
“So, here I am, driving, doing my thing, girlfriend back and forth to work, and then we get this one retired guy in Brentwood or whatever who just doesn’t like it, and he followed me to basically the bank and then it all started going from there.”
He said he was boxed in at an RBC parking lot and an altercation occurred.
“I went to the cop station to press charges and they ended up putting me under arrest when all I was doing was trying to go get dinner.”
After that incident, Hamilton received charges for the excessive noise, as well as an assault charge for the altercation.
Hamilton has been a music fan for years. Before he became a car audio installer, he spent time at Sound Solutions where he said “they closed at six, I stayed there ’til nine talking audio.” He said he and his girlfriend listen to many different genres.
“We listen to rap, hip hop, rock, everything. We’ve tried it all. They just don’t seem to care.”
Hamilton said that he is not against turning it down.
“I don’t know how loud it is from the outside. Man, I’m just living life. Doing my thing, and if someone asked me nicely and said ‘I live here,’ it wouldn’t be an issue; I’d have no problem. You got kids or something? Yeah, totally, I’ll turn it down by there, but you can’t fix something when you don’t know what’s wrong, right?”
His court date is on Oct. 25. Central Saanich police have been contacted for comment.
More to come.
