Image Credit: Dennis Surette

By James Peters

Poor Hospitality

Cross-country road trip gets off on the wrong foot with Kamloops break-in

Aug 16, 2019 | 11:42 AM

KAMLOOPS — A Nova Scotia resident says he doesn’t have a good taste in his mouth about Kamloops, after he and his daughter fell victim to a costly break-in last weekend.

Dennis Surette and his daughter, who is in the Navy, began driving across Canada last Saturday (Aug. 10). After living and training in Esquimalt, Surette’s daughter has been posted to Halifax.

The pair’s first stop for the night was at the Ramada Inn on Columbia St. West in Kamloops. Returning to their SUV in the Ramada parking lot Sunday morning, they found a smashed rear window and several valuable items missing.

Surette says that includes irreplaceable paperwork that was inside a backpack.

“She’s in the Navy and she had all her transfer papers and all that paperwork… which is very crucial. Papers for leave, you need all that,” said Surette. “Obviously, no good to anybody.”

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“The understanding is, they don’t keep copies of stuff. ‘Here you go, this is it. You lose it, you’re in trouble.'”

Image Credit: Dennis Surette

He’s holding out hope the stolen documents will turn up, but doesn’t hold out a lot of hope for his daughter’s camera equipment.

“She had a lot of camera gear, lenses, expensive camera gear… you know you’re never going to see that again,” said Surette.

As disappointing as the break-in was, Surette says the response from Kamloops RCMP was almost as troubling.

“The police called us up an hour-and-a-half after (we reported the break-in). That was a huge disappointment,” said Surette.

“The first thing he tells me is, ‘Yes, we’re having an awful problem with this in our area. It seems like there’s a car break-in almost every night. It’s a very common problem.’ Well, you’re calling me back an hour-and-a-half later, what’s the deterrence? Obviously, if nobody’s going to go after somebody, then of course they’re going to break into cars.”

Kamloops RCMP did not return a request for comment.

“To me, if you’re calling me back an hour-and-a-half later, there’s obviously no interest,” Surette continued. “That was the biggest disappointment, besides losing everything. Here’s our first stop, and now we’ve got the rest of Canada to cross with a smashed window.”

Surette and his daughter continued on eastward after improvising a repair to the vehicle’s smashed window. He spoke to CFJC Today over the phone Thursday from Wawa, Ontario, and said Kamloops won’t be at the top of his list of travel destinations anytime soon.

“It’s unfortunate that we have such a bad taste about your town right now, in our mouth,” said Surette. “It’s going to take a while before we have something good to say (about Kamloops), I guess.”

For the most recent map of auto break-ins in Kamloops, click here.