HALIFAX – The damage caused by a minivan crashing into a Halifax business could have been a lot worse had the owners not decided to close up early.
Just after 9:30 p.m. on Saturday, Halifax police said a black BMW trying to pass on the inside lane crashed into two parked vehicles on Quinpool Road, pushing one of them up onto the curb and sending it into the Deck Box.
Fortunately, the owners of the Deck Box had decided to leave early, at approximately 9:20 p.m., and there was no one inside the store.
“I think it’s a scary thing to have something like this happen.”
“We normally do all of our business right up in the front,” said Rachel Carter. “The two of us work right up in the front. Any customers we have are right up in the front so somebody could have gotten hurt if we were still here.”
Police said the four male occupants of the black BMW fled the scene. No one at the scene was injured.
Lacey Aikens was on the patio across the street and saw the situation unfold.
“It was pretty chaotic. Then three cop cars showed up right away.”
Phil Secord owns Secord Gallery, which is adjacent to the Deck Box. He said his business sustained very little damage.
“There is a little cracking in some of the cinder blocks that create the structure right inside the door,” he said.
He was struck by the intensity of the accident.
“It’s amazing that such a thing could happen. You hear about these things. You never expect it’s going to happen right next door so to speak.”
Joshua describes the damage to the front of the store, which opened last September, as extensive.
“We had a front facing wall and a door that no longer exist,” he said. “The work itself will probably take a couple weeks to a month or so. We’re hoping to be back up and running before then.”
He said there was minor damage to the inside of the store as well as the inventory. The Deck Box specializes in collectible card games and often holds events involving card games such as Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic.
The timing of their decision to leave early isn’t lost on the pair.
“A lot of glass made it very far back into the store. I would imagine at least somebody would have gotten cut up,” Rachel said.
“I’m glad myself and Rachel weren’t injured in any way and none of our clientele got impacted by it,” Joshua said.
The couple are taking the situation in stride and even with some humour.
“We wanted to re-paint the inside anyway so I guess this gives us a good time to actually do the painting,” Rachel said.
Suspect vehicle in police custody
Sgt. Kevin McNeil with Halifax Regional Police said officers are doing a forensic investigation of the suspect vehicle, which was left at the scene. He said that the vehicle was not stolen.
“It makes it easier in that we have something to work with. We don’t have to go and find the vehicle itself,” he said. “We still have quite a bit of work we have to do with that vehicle.”
“Any time there’s a motor vehicle hit-and-run there’s certain things we have to do to try and prove who was driving the vehicle. It poses some difficulties but we take everything available to us and we piece it together. At some point, we decide whether we can or cannot charge somebody.”
McNeil said the speed limit on Quinpool Road is 50 km/h but police are still trying to determine how fast the black BMW was going at the time of the crash.
He adds it is too early to say if alcohol was involved.
McNeil said there is no description of the four suspects.
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