Old North vandalism: Shocked and disgusted, The London Free Press
News Local
Monday, July 24, two thousand seventeen 8:22:06 EDT AM
Bill Downe taped cardboard over his neighbour’s vandalized garage door on Talbot Street in London Sunday, after vandals spray-painted “I will kill U”. In all, thirty Old North properties were defaced in the weekend spree. (DEREK RUTTAN, The London Free Press)
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Residents in a north London neighbourhood said they`re shocked and disgusted by obscene graffiti sprayed on homes, vehicles and fences.
«I have no clue why anybody would do this,» Lorna Macauley, a resident of Victoria Street, said Sunday. Her car was made the canvas for a vulgar photo.
A vandal or vandals used burst paint to deface as many as thirty properties in Old North.
Residents woke up Saturday to find vulgar words and pictures, written in mostly blue and orange, sprawled on walls, doors, windows, fences, back decks, front porches and vehicles via the neighbourhood. Many outdoor lights were smashed and construction pylons were found tipped over.
The messages followed similar themes – violence, mockery, and obscenities.
«White» was sprayed in blue on a white SUV. «For sale» and «sold» were written on the home that is for sale. «Blood», «death», and «die» were other messages still covering cars and houses Sunday.
Other harm had been cleaned up.
London police officers were in the neighbourhood all day Saturday, residents said. A police spokesperson said Sunday the street crime unit was investigating.
Homes and vehicles were bruised on Huron, Talbot, Victoria and St. George streets and Sunset Drive.
A trail of harm was left on St. George Street that is closed to traffic while it is rebuilt. Construction vehicles and the sidewalk were burst painted and a portable toilet toppled.
On the front door of a house on the street under construction was one word, «Why?»
Gary Davies, a contractor repairing a Talbot Street home, said the back door was kicked in Thursday night and some old contraptions were stolen.
No other harm was done to the home over the weekend.
Bill Downe lives on Talbot. His home was excluded from the tagging. He remembers hearing something outside his house at five a.m. Saturday.
«I thought I heard something. It was enough that I came to look out my windows, but I didn`t see anything,» he said.
«At about seven a.m. I was having my coffee and the kids around the corner were making a lot of noise about (the graffiti) and walking up and down the street talking about it.»
Downe`s neighbours, John and Betty Essey, were not so fortunate. They weren`t home Friday night. They returned from a vacation when another neighbour contacted them to tell them their front window was covered in splatter paint.
John Essey said that in the past the most trouble there has been in the neighbourhood is noise from Western University students.
«Never ever have they done (&timid;graffiti),» he said.
Betty Essey said that as long as she has lived in the neighbourhood, nothing like this has ever happened before. She grew up in the duo`s home on Talbot.
Essey is eighty nine years old.
«For the last five years, we`ve never had any problems with students,» she said.