The week of September 5 to September 11 saw no repeat of the counterfeit money issues reported last week. Investigation has led to police learning the identity of at least one of the parties and they are known to police. A Report to Crown Counsel has been compiled and charges are being recommended. No further details of the suspect will be released pending charge approval.

The Oak Bay Police Department has received two reports of assaults on women jogging nearby or on the campus at the University of Victoria. Incidents of a similar nature have also occurred at other locations throughout the Greater Victoria area.  The Saanich Police Department have recently taken a male suspect into custody involving one of these similar incidents and Saanich Police Detectives are liaising with the Oak Bay Police to determine if this suspect might also be responsible for the incidents that have occurred in Oak Bay.  The two incidents which occurred in Oak Bay are described below:

On September 6^th, the OBPD received a report from a 43-year-old female who stated that a male had attempted to grab her while she was out jogging near Ring Road on September 5^th at 6:45am. She managed to step away from him and confront him at which time he got on a mountain bike and rode away. The woman had seen the same male the day before when he stepped out from some bushes along Gordon Head Road and started to approach her before turning away. The male is described as being in his 20’s, wearing a black hoody.

On September 10^th, police received a report from an 18-year-old woman who had been jogging on a trail at UVic when a man grabbed her buttocks. The incident occurred at 7:50pm. This male was described as 19-21 years old, about 5’7”, wearing a grey baseball hat on backwards and grey track pants. He was riding a “road” bike with a Bluetooth speaker affixed to the handle bars and was listening to rap music. There was a skateboard affixed to the rear of the bike.

In a traffic note, a 57-year-old male was responsible for the 7-day impound of his mother’s car when he was caught driving without a licence. The male was first observed turning onto Oak Bay Ave from Hampshire at 9am on September 7^th. He was speaking on his cell phone as he passed the police officer. He last held a valid driver’s licence in 2007 and has been caught driving while prohibited before. He was ticketed for the use of the cell phone while driving and the vehicle was impounded.

Oak Bay Police Reserve Officers will be attending Oak Bay businesses over the next couple of weeks with counterfeit detection education kits and will be reminding merchants how best to help police identify and charge people suspected of passing counterfeit notes.

Did you know… The Oak Bay Police Department destroys a plethora of found property every year. Bikes, cell phones, strollers, wallets, jewellery, etc are all turned in to the police on a regular basis. We do everything we can to match found property against the reports of lost/stolen property across the CRD but unfortunately, many items aren’t returned to those who have been deprived of them. The disconnect is generally due to the fact that many, if not most people, are not reporting their items missing. Please do! And note, the better description you can give of your item the better. Serial numbers and pictures are the most helpful. We only hold turned in items for 90 days.