Stratford’s Police Chief says trying to find who targeted a city restaurant in a hate crime involving homophobic graffiti will be a difficult investigation.
Greg Skinner was one of the officials who spoke at a community meeting Wednesday night at the Stratford Pride Community Centre held to provide an update on the vandalism at Sirkel Foods.
Skinner says a preliminary investigation is underway but so far police haven’t been able to identify any witnesses or find any surveillance footage that would help them.
Thousands of people could have been through the parking lot near the restaurant between Monday afternoon at 4 and 5 the next morning, making it difficult to identify a suspect.
“I would like to think that we will be able to find those responsible but the police aren’t going to be able to do this on their own, the police are going to need some help from the public if this is to be solved.”
He is asking anyone with any information on what happened to call the police.
According to officials at the meeting hate crimes have been on the rise in Stratford.
Chief Skinner says Stratford has issues with race-based hate, gender-based hate, misogyny as well as same-sex hate.
He says those are things that we need to be able to address.
The police chief says people who are more vulnerable are feeling less safe and secure and it’s our responsibility as citizens of this city to address that and do something about it.
Mayor-elect Martin Ritsma says the city supports the LGBTQ+ community and he wants everyone to feel safe here, although no concrete plans were decided on moving forward.
