Police say 12 vehicles in Clairemont were vandalized with racial slurs early Saturday morning and a resident's surviellance system may have caught the culprits.
Residents on Berwick Drive and surrounding streets woke to see swastikas and racial words spray painted on their vehicles in red, green and black.
Residents believe the culprits are three young skateboarders seen on surveillance video, shortly after 2 a.m. The dark video shows the skateboarders riding slowly down the street, occasionally stopping at certain vehicles, then riding on. Residents of the neighborhood hope they are caught and brought to justice.
"There's three of them. Fortunately we have them on video and now the sheriffs have them on video. Hopefully something will come of it," said Ron Blaze as he used charcoal lighter fluid to clean the spray paint of his SUV.
Residents on the street say they are tired of the crime in their area. Blaze had his windows broken earlier this year. He says flashlights and change were stolen out of the truck, which leads him to believe that the act was committed by youth.
Neighbors say a total of 11 vehicles had their windows smashed in the same incident. In other incidents, people had feces wiped on their cars. It's one reason that one resident installed a high tech surveillance system in an effort to catch crime on video.
While the symbols and slurs painted on the vehicles suggest a possible hate crime, at least some of the slurs didn't match the races of the residents. Blaze believes race was not the motivating factor.
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"It's not a personal vendetta. It is a random act of idiocy. It's just a random act of kids going out and having fun. And their definition of fun is way off base," he said. "It's not a personal vendetta. It is a random act of idiocy. It's just a random act of kids going out and having fun. And their definition of fun is way off base," he said.
