Napping B.C. business owner foils vehicle-ramming robbery attempt

A destructive Langley, B.C., break-in attempt was foiled this week, thanks to a business owner who’d made the snap decision to sleep on his couch.

It happened on Wednesday, at a business park on 201 Street near 96 Avenue in the Township of Langley.

Terence Sawtell was working late at his business Hang Tight, when he decided to take a nap on the shop couch.

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That’s when he heard something smash into the neighbouring business, Wiser’s Wide World of Collectibles.

“Saw some lights, a car was kind of doing some back and forth, and then out of nowhere, backed up, full speed, rammed into the thing and I’m laying on the couch, panic, I run to the back of my shop, he keeps going back and forth ramming it more and more,” he said.

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“It was just a really loud crash, really low, you could tell the person obviously hit it with speed — at first I thought it was a drunk driver … and then it just repeated four more times.”

Sawtell ran to the back of his shop and hid behind his car while he called 911.

He said Langley RCMP were on the scene within five minutes and quickly apprehended the suspect who had filled a garbage bag with items from the collectibles business.

“I was just kind of freaked out and scared. Like if someone is willing to do that, put themselves in that kind of harm, if it somehow gets to me they are probably willing to do anything at that point,” he said.

“I wasn’t down for a fight against a car and a person obviously with very little care for their own bodily harm.”

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The shop front for the collectibles business suffered significant damage, including a smashed window and door, along with structural damage to the building’s frontage.

Wiser’s Wide World of Collectibles declined to comment.

“It’s not the first time this year that business was the target of a break and enter,” Langley RCMP Const. Simon Lepine said.

“Our members are doing proactive patrols every night to prevent those events, that’s why that night we were so quick.”

Phillip Sprentzel, 39, is facing charges of break-and-enter and possessing stolen property.

Sawtell said the business has been the target of three break-in attempts in four months, but that in the past it’s been hard to catch the person responsible.

“The RCMP officer was like, ‘What are the odds of you being here at this time,” Sawtell said.

“I’ve literally stayed on this couch, in two years, twice.”