Downtown Windsor thefts strike a chord with local musicians

A series of downtown Windsor break-ins have cost local musicians thousands of dollars in equipment.

Drummer Vanessa Harnish said her bass pedal and drumsticks were stolen Sunday, costing her $600. Two nights prior, another musician, Nicholas Baddelay, lost about $2,500 worth of equipment.

According to them, police are not giving the incidents enough attention. But authorities say there's only so much they can do considering there's very little information to go by.

Gone before she knew it

Harnish had just wrapped up a Sunday night show at Phog Lounge. She said there was quite a turnout because the performance was being recorded for a local podcast.

"We had a lot of friends that had come to our show. We all stayed there and had poutine. That's the Phog's specialty," Harnish said.

By 11:35 p.m., all of the performers had packed up their equipment and left, except for two people — Harnish and the sound engineer.

"I had one more [box] of equipment to grab from Phog," she said, adding she always locked her car every time she stepped away into the venue.

Harnish stopped to talk to the sound engineer outside of Phog Lounge less than 10 metres away from her vehicle. With the long night having come to an end, she walked toward her car.

"I went to put my stuff in my vehicle and I noticed that my driver's side window had been broken."

A bass pedal and a bag of drumsticks and mallets had gone missing. She said the value of the stolen property amounts to about $650.

Police never showed up

Though Harnish had been walking in and out of Phog Lounge at the time of the break-in, she never actually saw anyone taking her property.

Nonetheless, she immediately called the Windsor Police Service's non-emergency line. Harnish said she was told there were no officers available to come to the scene.

She said Windsor police elected to simply start a case file rather than immediately search for the suspect. Harnish said this is a perfect example of police dismissing incidents like these because more serious crimes are occurring more often in the city.

"That same night, there was a shooting an hour later downtown and there was a stabbing this week. There's a lot of theft going on."

Harnish said when she took her car to an auto repair shop in the morning, staff informed her they received three other cars which were also broken into the previous night.

As for the the Phog Lounge, an employee there told CBC News that police take up to an hour to arrive whenever they call to report a break-in — long after the suspect has fled the scene.

She's not the only one

A similar incident occurred Tuesday night when Nicholas Baddelay's drum equipment was stolen after a Tuesday night performance at The Beer Exchange.

He had kept his property in a friend's vehicle — they were both part of the same five-person jazz band which had just performed.

After the show, they parked the car on Pelissier Street with intentions of eating at Acapulco Delight Restaurant. But it was closed, so they stopped at the Manchester Pub, one street over, instead for "about a half hour."

"We came back out and we found the rear-left window smashed and my gear missing," Baddelay said.

Baddelay said he called police immediately, but was told they would not send somebody out because the car's transmission had not been tampered with.

Police procedure when no suspect is named

According to Sgt. Steve Betteridge, Windsor police place theft reports with no suspect low on their priority list. He said complainants have two options in cases like these to "speed up the process."

They can either use an online reporting service or contact the telephone reporting unit.

"That's our policy. That's to free up resources for higher priority calls," Betteridge said, adding police will pursue any further evidence if any arises. 

"The best example is if somebody walked into an emergency room with a sore throat ... that person may wait quite a while before they're seen because there's some higher priority cases."

Betteridge said if there are a large number of reports coming in about one specific type of crime through their online and telephone reporting services, they will allocate their resources accordingly to help stop that trend.

Other musicians concerned they could be next

Nathan Schiller will be the music director for Hair at the Capitol Theatre on September 7. He hasn't experienced the feeling of having his equipment stolen like Harnish and Baddelay, but that doesn't mean Schiller isn't concerned that could change very soon.

"It's always been on my mind. On tour, it was something I worried about all the time," Schiller said, adding he always had two people assigned to watch the equipment — one in the venue and one by the transport vehicle.

The news of recent break-ins against local musicians has been "alarming" for Schiller, who said he lets his guard down when performing in his home city of Windsor.

"It sucks that every time you leave your house with an instrument, you're thinking, 'Is there a chance that this is going to get taken from me?' The thought of losing [my guitars] is terrible because from a financial and sentimental point of view, I can't replace them."

Tips to stay safe

For Schiller, keeping his stuff out of the hands of thieves is a result of being cautious. He said, whether he's performing or not, he will never keep one of his guitars in a vehicle unattended. 

"If I'm going to have a drink at a bar and I have a guitar with me, the guitar's coming with me even if I'm not playing," he said.

From the time that your gear enters a venue to the time that it is back in your house, you can't take your eyes off it.- musician Nathan Schiller 

"Years ago, I knew people that, after shows, would come home and leave their gear in a car overnight. They'd wake up the next morning to all their stuff missing."

He said musicians need to be aware that leaving equipment unattended is always dangerous.

"From the time that your gear enters a venue to the time that it is back in your house, you can't take your eyes off it."