Residents of a Burnaby apartment complex are still struggling to wrap their heads around a bizarre police incident that saw a man fall as many as 11 storeys into a bush, where he suffered serious injuries.
Global News spoke to several residents of the building in the 4900-block of Sanders Street, who reported hearing an explosion and seeing members of the RCMP Emergency Response Team descend on the building.
According to police, officers were responding to a reported kidnapping. When they arrived, three men attempted to flee over the 11th-floor balcony.
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Two men managed to successfully climb down to lower floors, but one fell into a shrub where he was badly injured, police said. It was not immediately clear whether he fell from the 11th floor or a lower balcony.
The alleged kidnapping victim was unharmed, police said.
Residents said the incident shaped up around 9:30 p.m. Thursday.
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Elena Potapova, who lives on the sixth floor, told Global news she heard a crackling sound, similar to fireworks, followed by a loud bang like a bomb going off.
“It felt like the walls were shaking,” she said.
Potapova grabbed her baby and ran outside.
“There was somebody laying on the ground, somebody fell out,” she said, adding she saw first responders working on the man for about 15 minutes before loading him into an ambulance.
Potapova added that she also saw police on a fifth-floor balcony.
Tina, who did not want to give her last name, lives in the first-floor apartment directly adjacent to the bush that broke the man’s fall.
She said she was in her bedroom when she heard the sound of an explosion, followed by a fire alarm — at which point she ran outside.
“The police were yelling, it was just chaos,” she said. “There was a guy they were working on, apparently he jumped from the balcony.”
Tina told Global News she saw officers attempting to arrest a second man.
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“The police had a guy on the ground, there was SWAT guys … four guys kneeling on this one guy and they were yelling, ‘Stop stabbing me, stop stabbing me,'” she said.
“It makes me wonder who are my neighbours?”
Potapova said police kept residents outside for several hours, and stayed on site searching the bushes until about 2 a.m.
READ MORE: 3 more suspects arrested in connection with 2016 kidnapping in East Vancouver
She said even after police left, an unusual odour lingered around the building.
“Like after an explosion or something, this smell,” she said. “It was there all night.
“You know, I think it’s a crazy neighbourhood, everything happens here all the time.”
Police said the three suspects were taken into custody, with one of them still in hospital.
B.C.’s civilian police watchdog, the Independent Investigation Office, has been deployed to the scene.
The IIO’s mandate is to investigate any interaction with police that leads to serious harm or death.
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