Last Thursday Louis Poitras came home to his property on Read Island, located northeast of Campbell River, to find his sheds collapsed and burning and the firewood stacked next to his house on fire.
Had he been away for the weekend, like he usually is, his house would have burned down.
Grabbing the garden hose, he managed to save his home.
“I found the door had been kicked in, the window was smashed,” he said. “My first thought was that the propane tank had blown and the blast had blown it in.”
It wasn’t until he got to his bedroom and saw his dresser drawers and belongings strewn everywhere that he knew there had been a break-in.
So far, Poitras knows for sure that the vandals took two chainsaws, two small generators another saw and a small rototiller. There might have been other tools taken but he can’t be sure as he is still cleaning up the rubble.
He said the value of the stuff taken was, maximum, $2,000.
Though Poitras has lived there for 72 years, he doesn’t plan on rebuilding.
“Maybe it is a really good hint to move to town,” he said with a laugh, adding that he is going to stick with that as a positive way to spin things.
What he is wondering about is why? What was the point of trashing his house and trying to burn it down? Who would do this?
However, his nearest neighbour is a half mile down the road and he doesn’t lock up when he leaves the Island, which is regularly.
“When my boat is not at the dock I am not home,” he said. “The fact that I haven’t been ripped off before is kind of surprising.”
But there was no need to burn and destroy everything he added.
He called the Quadra Island RCMP the next morning, and they referred him to the Higgitt, one of the RCMP vessels that works in the area.
