News of recent burglaries and home invasions in the Greater Toronto Area prompted Bianca Salna to share what her family has endured after their King City home was broken into days before Christmas.
Salna, a real estate investor, said she wants to bring awareness of what’s happening in her community after two thieves brazenly trashed their home looking for valuables and stole her property.
“It’s shocking what happened to our house,” she said.
The robbery occurred Dec. 20 at around 8 p.m. while she, her husband and their five-year-old son were vacationing in Florida.
They weren’t notified what happened until three days later, when the person tasked with feeding their fish and maintaining the tank entered the home and saw broken windows.
According to the family’s security camera footage, the thieves — wearing all-black clothing, masks and carrying flashlights — climbed a ladder and broke through a second-floor window of their 15,000-square-foot home.
Salna said the thieves were likely armed and that she believes they walked through a forest at the back of their 12-acre property.
“If we were home, one of us could have been killed,” she said, echoing a home invasion by three individuals last week in nearby Nobleton, where a woman and her two dogs were shot, killing one of her pets.
“We don’t have any weapons, we don’t have anything to protect ourselves.”
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Her husband believed he had turned on the home’s security system while they were away, but for some reason, it failed to connect. Their property was unprotected for a week.
Salna said a home builder had warned her five years ago of thieves in the area who enter houses through second-floor windows to avoid security systems set up on the first floor. They target master bedrooms and grab anything of value.
She thought nothing of it after living there peacefully for five years. Until last month’s burglary.
Before leaving on vacation, Salna said she locked the master bedroom to maintain privacy when someone came by to take care of the home.
However, the locks didn’t stop the thieves as they broke through the door and entered the walk-in closet, which was unlocked.
They also ransacked the rest of the home.
Gone are her husband’s antique coins kept in his home office that he inherited from his, uncle along with her jewelry and designer fashion clothing — including sportswear and running shoes. The stolen items were packed into the family’s extra suitcases.
The thieves also damaged a wall inside the closet covered by a small metal plate that they thought contained valuables.
After more than an hour of grabbing whatever they could find, the bandits escaped by breaking through a master bedroom window, located on the first floor.
“Somebody could have been home,” Salna said. “We have a very big home…. Somebody could have been home upstairs or in a different wing or somewhere (else). I’m shocked that these people actually are so brazen that they would smash our window. What if someone was home?”
Salna said her husband, who works for a large software company in Canada, is optimistic that another burglary won’t happen as the family has beefed up protections inside and outside the home, including the hiring of a security guard.
However, Salna added, she is afraid her home will be targeted once again and wants to warn the community.
“There are a lot of break-ins and a lot of this type of crime happening,” she said. “I thought maybe I should warn people around here to be a lot more smarter than me because I feel like I could have done a lot more to protect my home.”