Police on Vancouver Island say a dispute between two drivers vying for a spot in a busy Walmart parking lot exploded in violence over the long weekend, when one man allegedly attacked the other driver with bear spray, catching his four young children in the crossfire.
The man who got sprayed then retaliated, wielding a tire iron to smash a window of the other driver’s vehicle, Nanaimo RCMP alleged Wednesday.
The confrontation at Woodgrove Centre started around 12:45 p.m. PT on Monday when a man driving a what appeared to be a Hummer SUV cut off a family of six about to turn their truck towing a large boat into a free stall, police say.
“The two drivers, they get all heated, they jump out, they start yelling at each other and then the [SUV driver] goes back to his car and took bear spray and hits [the other driver] in the face with it,” Const. Gary O’Brien with Nanaimo RCMP told CBC News on Wednesday.
The man’s four kids, aged between one and six, were also struck by the bear spray, though the man’s wife was not, said O’Brien.
“To make it worse, then the [father] goes back to his car and pulls out a tire iron and starts smashing at the guy’s Hummer and then the Hummer takes off,” he claimed.
The man and all four children were treated by paramedics on scene but did not need to go to the hospital, according to police.
Police are looking for the driver of the SUV, who they say fled south on Hwy 19A after the altercation. He is described as a white man in his sixties with grey hair who was wearing a green shirt at the time.
“He may have a totally different version and that’s why we need to talk to him,” said O’Brien, noting that it’s unclear whether charges will come from the incident without a way to track the SUV driver down.
“This basically started off as a consensual fight, but then it got elevated very quickly with the bear spray, so we could be looking at assault with a weapon for that individual,” he said.
O’Brien says “cooler heads” should have prevailed and implored drivers to take responsibility for their actions.
“There’s no reason why this situation got to where it did,” he said. “If you’re faced with something like that, just take a few moments, take a deep breath, collect your thoughts.”