Car windows smashed in new vandalism spree

IN YET another case of sheer vandalism within a week in Doha, windows of about 10 vehicles were smashed in the Bin Mahmoud area early yesterday.

Shocked victims, while describing the “outrageous act”, spoke about how their morning turned miserable as they approached their vehicles to go to work.

“At 7am, as I came near my Toyota four-wheeler, I saw glass shards lying on the passenger seat. A closer inspection showed a smashed right-side passenger window,” an affected vehicle owner, who has been in Qatar for only one year, told Gulf Times.

“Then two other neighbours showed up, narrating similar woes,” she said.

“Upon dialling 999, we were asked to call the Capital Police, who asked us to bring the vehicles to the station. As the three of us were waiting at the station, three more motorists showed up, with the window panes of their vehicles smashed too.”

One of the victims said that as the first group of six was leaving at 11am after recording their statement, two more motorists drove in with broken windows.

“Upon inquiries, it turned out that all the vehicles belonged to residents of the Bin Mahmoud area.”

“This time it might be easy for the police to catch the attacker as a closed-circuit TV (CCTV) camera installed near the garage of one of victims has caught the vandal on film,” a vehicle owner said.

The film has been handed over to the police, it is learnt.

[Image caption: The smashed window of a vehicle.]

“We have a total of three vehicles and we recently installed a CCTV camera as a matter of precaution. On Monday evening, we reached home at 10.30pm and switched on the camera at 11pm,” she said.

According to her, the footage shows a man wearing a thobe peeping inside the car and moments later hitting the pane with a “large metal object”.

The man is seen entering the vehicle through the smashed window and sitting inside for about five minutes. “He then moves to the other car but leaves it alone after standing near it for a few seconds,” she said.

According to the victims, the window panes facing the walls have been broken, probably because that side provided cover to the attacker.

Last Saturday, hundreds of tyres of vehicles parked in the Al Saad area were slashed in the first case of its kind in Qatar.