BALTIMORE (WBFF) — In the middle of the night on Wednesday, through a cracked window, David Bogdan was suddenly awoken by the sound of air seeping out of his Jeep’s tires outside.
“It must have been a knife or something very sharp, because it went straight in and made a really clean cut,” Bogdan said. “It didn’t take very long for the tires to go flat.”
Or for the crime to be committed. Home surveillance video captures what appears to be a group of four young people approaching his parked car around 1 a.m. Seconds later, you can hear the air starting to escape, as do the suspects.
“Came outside just to check to see if anybody’s still around, but there was nobody there. I came out to this,” Bogdan said, pointing to his four completely flat tires.
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Bogdan says the tires will cost roughly $1,500 to replace, in addition to missing work the next day, due to a lack of transportation.
“I work really hard for what we have, you know. And for somebody to do this, it’s very disheartening,” he said.
Bogdan says, at first he feared the vandalism was personal. However, after posting the surveillance video in the Canton community Facebook group, several others shared similar stories.
One person wrote, “Got me too on your block. Right in front of Snake Hill. One tire slashed.” Another wrote, “Happened to my husband last night too. On S Highland and Foster near Chasseur.”
“Supposedly they hit another almost a dozen cars, or maybe even a little bit more,” said Bogdan.
Baltimore Police confirmed they received five destruction of property reports in the area that same night. In a statement, the department added, “While we believe there may be additional incidents, we encourage anyone who may have been a victim to contact the police.”
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“Just walking through and causing havoc,” said Bogdan, “I mean, what are they doing out? If I’m correct about their age, what are they doing out at 1:30 in the morning?”
Bogdan argues that at a time when homicides and shootings are down in the city, other crimes impacting residents’ daily lives remain a source of frustration.
“I really feel like the youth policies in the city, as far as crime go, are very poor,” he said, “Everybody’s getting a slap on the wrist. There’s no real consequences for anything that they do.”
And as police continue to search for the suspects in his case, Bogdan says it’s people like him left paying the price.
“It’s expensive enough as it is, with all the taxes and other fees and fines, everything going up. I mean, it costs a small fortune to put tags on your vehicle anymore,” he said, “And then to have this kind of stuff happen, you know, it just makes living here a lot harder every day.”
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