Burnaby RCMP arrest man suspected of harassing 2 women

A 20-year-old man was arrested earlier this month after allegedly harassing two women in south Burnaby.

The Burnaby RCMP says the suspect left handwritten notes for the victims on eight different occasions between Sept. 15 and Nov. 3.

“The notes expressed thoughts of a sexual nature and implied that the suspect was watching the victims,” Mounties said, adding that the victims lived in two neighbouring apartment buildings in the area of Telford Avenue and Beresford Street.

“The suspect does live in the same area,” Corp. Mike Kalanj confirmed, adding that he has since been released.

“He has strict conditions, very strict conditions: not to contact the victims; not to be anywhere that the victims are known to be; he has to report to a bail supervisor.”

Kalanj says the suspect left notes as well as “some little gifts,” including women’s underwear.

He says the RCMP is releasing information about the incidents to bring attention to criminal harassment.

Mounties provided a list of actions to help identify harassment behaviour, including:

• Calling you over and over again, and perhaps hanging up when you answer the phone;
• Contacting you on the internet or through constant e-mail messages;
• Following you, your family, or friends;
• Leaving threatening voice messages;
• Sending you gifts you do not want;
• Watching you or tracking where you go; and
• Threatening you, your children, family, pets, or friends.

“The other reason we are putting this out to the public is just to find out if there happened to be any other victims out there,” said Kalanj.

“We want to know if there’s anyone else out there that has received notes like this, or even anything remotely like this, and we’d ask them to come forward, speak to our investigators, so we can help them.”

Anyone who may have been the victim of this type of crime is asked to please report it to local police.