Fire chief’s wife loses precious pictures in break-in
In Calgary’s worsening burglary climate, not even the home of the city’s fire chief is immune.
On Monday, Chief Steve Dongworth’s home was ravaged in a break and enter, and a camera containing valued photos of kids who are fighting cancer was one of the possessions taken.
Dongworth’s wife, Sheree, was the official photographer at an event last Saturday helping kids with cancer and a memory card with numerous photos from that day was stolen along with $20,000 of other property.
The thief or thieves — who kicked in and wrenched open the Braeside residence’s front door — turned much of the home upside down during the burglary, said Sheree Dongworth.
“It’s turmoil, from top to bottom, every part of the house,” she said.
“There’s no safe place to hide anything in your home, I know that now.”
Some of the items stolen were of sentimental value, such as heirloom jewelry, said Dongworth.
But it’s the photo memory card that’s the biggest, most emotional loss, she said.
She took up to 200 shots, many of them of “three special children” recovering from cancer who attended the Believe in the Gold event at the Palace Theatre on Stephen Avenue.
“I promised all the parents of those children I would get them those photos, so these pictures are pretty important,” said an emotional Dongworth. “I’ve broken my promise to them.”
She’s appealing to whoever has the camera to mail or drop off the data card to the police or a news outlet, no questions asked.
The card would be in a Nikon D-5600 camera, whose serial numbers is 500883.
It was stored in a black and green waist camera bag.
“My husband was going to download the pictures the night before but figured he could do it later,” said Dongworth.
Last year, the number of break and enters in Calgary was up by 39 per cent, with 23 of them occurring daily.
Police say much of that increase is due to a rise in opioid drug use and a slumping economy.