BEST STORY EVER | Jeremy Jones
BEST STORY EVER
Jeremy Jones | Assisted Burglary At Mountain Retreat
I walked in the door at Mountain Retreat Hotel in Squamish, BC, at around 7 p.m. after a long sunny day in the Whistler backcountry. Right away I noticed the room had been messed with. I looked across the room to the desk, my computer and my hard drive were gone. It had been on that same desk in the same location for a week. My heart sank. And my anger and concern heightened. I ran to the front desk, the kid working told me had made a key for room 220 for a man in his mid-50s, “Was that not your friend?” he asked me. I tore into the kid to get more details and came to find out that he had kicked a drunk homeless-looking man out of the pool for swimming naked due to customers’ complaints about 4:30 p.m. The same man came back 15 minutes later and told him he needed a room key for his room 220. This kid at the front desk actually made it for him! No ID, no name check, nothing.
So, I file a police report with the RCMP, take a more thorough scan through the room to see what else was stolen.
1. MacBook Pro computer 2. Lacie hard drive 1TB
3. Adidas hiking boots
4. Jameson shoes
4. Duffle bag
5. Hatch fly reel
6. Nixon comp watch 7. Snickers bar
The next morning I decide to stay down in the valley from a sunny day
of filming to see if I can track down my crap. Justin Myers stayed back with me as well. The RCMP were so slow to respond that night, I figured if it was left to them I would never see my stuff again. The hard drive had thousands and thousands of family photos and seasons’ footage. Although some if it was double-backed, some wasn’t and I wasn’t sure what would be lost forever.
So we rent a car so we could be mobile and hit up Stuntwood Skate Shop. The owner Mike seems to be plugged in well to what’s happening around Squamish, I thought we should start there. He gave us good intel, which led Justin and I to a stakeout in front of the Heeling Hands Homeless shelter.
It was right around the time when they were serving breakfast, so our odds were good that we would see the thief wearing my shoes or something of my property. Nothing much after about 20 minutes of sniffing around.
This one dude that was hanging around and talking to everyone seemed pretty together and not too lit up on some substance. I asked him if he worked there. He said, “No, why? What’s up?” I said I had some important stuff stolen from my hotel room and I need to find it. He paused, then held his arm out to show me his wrist, “Is this your watch?” he asked. Sure enough the fool had my watch on.
Justin and I launch out the truck and start into questioning the guy. “It’s my friend Mikey,” he says. “You’re not going to hit him are you? He has seizures if he gets hit!”
Justin and I keep our cool and just say we won’t do anything if I get my stuff back in one piece. “Take us to Mikey! Where’s Mikey!”
We eventually find Mikey and begin shaking him down. He’s denying it all and claims nothing. His friend is yelling at him, “Mikey, give them their stuff back! You can’t get hit, Mikey, you’ll have a seizure!” And the dude won’t really crack, he’s drunk as ever and honestly, I’m surprised he even remembered anything it all.
Justin chimes in, “Yo, Mikey, we will give you money if you get our stuff for us.” Mikey pauses to think. I tell him he has 20 seconds to take us to my crap or I take him to the cops. “Fifteen seconds, Mikey” I yell. “Ten seconds!” and Mikey cracks “OK, OK, OK! I’ll take you to get it... can I get a ride?”
Justin and I, Mikey and “Mikey’s friend,” get in the truck and they take us to Mikey’s brother’s Dave’s house. We walk in the back door and the thief is literally sliding his greasy foot into my skate kicks. We just start into the dude “Give us our crap, dude, or we are taking you to the cops!”
Dave starts yelling at Mikey about bringing us there and going on and on how he doesn’t even want the stuff, he wants nothing to do with it, and on and on. “Yo, man, then give us our crap now!” He says it’s around the corner.
For whatever reason, how it was playing out, he ended up leaving to get it and me telling him he had five minutes. That was a long five minutes. Justin is making sure the other two don’t run off and I’m pacing the driveway.
Sure enough the dude pulls up in minutes with my computer and hard drive. We load up and start to pin it out of there and Mikey is yelling for the money we “offered” and his brother last-minute grabs Mikey and tries to throw him into the truck as we burn out of there.
Don’t kid yourself. It’s pretty wild in the streets of Squamish, keep your shit locked up tight, cause these fools are on a rampage. Five days after this heist Jake Welch pulled back into town. Immediately he had two fly rods stolen out of his truck—nutso.