Suspect in assault on senior turns himself in; charges pending
By Lethbridge Herald on September 12, 2025.
Al Beeber
Lethbridge Herald
An 80-year-old city man is in critical condition after being assaulted while trying to recover a stolen bicycle on Wednesday.
An unidentified 34-year-old man is facing charges of aggravated assault after the incident in North Lethbridge.
Police say the senior’s bike had been stolen from outside a business and when the elderly man confronted a person, he was punched and fell backward, striking his head on pavement along the 1200 block of 2 Avenue North.
The senior was taken to Chinook Regional Hospital before being airlifted to Foothills Hospital in Calgary.
Witnesses gave police images of the suspect, who was identified by police. Extensive police resources were deployed and about 8 p.m. the wanted man called dispatch to turn himself in. He was then arrested at a northside home without incident.
Police also on Wednesday laid charges after the tactical team had to be deployed to a residence on Mt. Sundial Court  in the westside  subdivision of Sunridge.
The team was deployed after a report was received by LPS of a woman  armed with a knife who was trying to gain entry to a unit in the  suited residence. The woman, an occupant of another unit in the home,  had broken the glass in a door then barricaded herself in her own  home. She didn’t respond to police demands to leave but surrendered  several hours later.
Katie Jane Scory, 26, of Lethbridge is charged with attempted  housebreaking, possession of a weapon offensive dangerous to the  public and resisting a peace officer. Scory was released from custody and is scheduled to appear in court on Oct. 21.Police Service, the male was arrested at his residence in Calgary. A search warrant was subsequently executed at the home and additional evidence seized.
10-9
This poor person trying to keep his only means of transportation from being stolen by this bum shows that we need to stand up and get LPS to end the loitering, vagrancy, encampments where most of the crime stems that pushes away customers from our businesses. If we cannot get police to do their jobs then we need to replace leadership.
I have lost track how many bicycles have been stolen from friends and some of my customers and I would guess hundreds of bikes have been stolen by these ‘criminals’, not the most vulnerable as many try to name them, and many kids no longer get to enjoy their bikes. One person had is bike stolen out of his pick up truck which had a canopy on it. A friend who witnessed it called police, they never called him to ask any questions to help find it, arrived 30 minutes later, drove around for about 10 minutes and went back to their event they were having. The person who called then went out walking and saw that person with the bike walking with it, only 1 1/2 blocks away from where it was stolen, almost 45 minutes later.
How hard did the police try to find this criminal? When the owner found the bike weeks later, there was only the frame left! He said he would rebuild it around the frame.
Bike thefts are a major issue and police rarely do anything about it, many times they stop the criminals for some issue, but fail to check if the bike is stolen, it must be not criminal enough for them to bother!
We have tried to get police to end these encampments and to take back our streets, parks and downtown by stopping these criminals from hanging out all night committing crimes then sleeping in the park or other areas all day, just to do it all again at night! Police do nothing! Why do we pay them to do nothing?
Luckily this person hasn’t died from his injuries, but it is only a matter of time that someone does! In the last couple of years, 2 senior women were attacked within days within a block, while they tried to prevent these scum from stealing their purses.
If police do not do their jobs who do we call? How much do we pay these people to protect our property and our lives? Where are their priorities? As coffee friend states repeatedly, leadership keeps saying every other city has it so we must just accept it!
Well we don’t have to and as he also has presented mutiple times before committees, ‘what happens on our streets is what we allow to happen on our streets’.
If I didn’t have to look after my business I would be at the next police commission meeting demand change on our policing, and if needed leadership, because too many others are just sitting back, like the leadership and doing nothing!
There have been many assaults, break and enters and property damage in that area, as many who refuse to use the shelter sleep rough and driving down there you can see businesses with plywood covers where a window was broken to gain entry, or broken windows, graffiti, as you see downtown!
One police officer stated in the news that these people who are in encampments or sleeping in doorways commit over 70% of the crimes in the area, but police do nothing to reduce those numbers.
Many of us have fought too long for change, while others just don’t care anymore, until it costs them. Sad to say so many people just lay over and play dead and allow our city to become like Vancouver!
My thoughts are with this senior citizen who must now suffer from this criminal act and at that age, may never fully recover. It should not have happened! It is shameful!
Say What I feel your frustration and have fited a Formal Complaint trying to bring change so incidents such as these are reduced.
What many are not aware of is that the only reason this made headlines is because this poor soul sustained serious injuries and had to be airlifted to Calgary, which I think could mean it was a brain injury. The public never hears of all the assaults and thefts and in many cases today, people don’t bother to call LPS anymore, myself included, because we have lost faith in them. It is a waste of time!
Last October the Police Commission meeting was filled with angry residents and business owners, many had been assaulted or their staff, or suffered losses in other areas to a point, the Chief of Police cut them off after 12 stood up voicing their concerns . . . he refused the many others remaining to voice their concerns, which violated their rights to express concerns in that forum before the Commission!
In my Formal Complaint, I expressed concerns of allowing the sleeping rough and encampments to grow and the failure in their strategy, the concerns that LPS was not taking complaints seriously and failed to take reasonable measures to find the offenders when LPS finally arrived, looked for a short period of time and then said ‘can’t locate them’ but I walked out more than once, and found them within 1 block and within 5 minutes, and I brought forth some other concerns in a 15 page letter.
The Chief responded:
” . . .for the purposes of your complaint, I do not see a change in LPS priorities, policy or service delivery to be warranted. No further action in this regard will be taken by the Service, and your complaint, effectively, is dismissed . . . “
This is now escalated to an appeal before the Police Commission, which I suspect will go nowhere and I will then take the matter up the Alberta Justice and Sol-Gen.
This is my last fight for this city! If people want to end up looking like Vancouver DTES, which is only 9,000 people, or the greater DTES which is about 20,000 and the costs so be it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtown_Eastside
It is your tax dollars, but you will lose other services and supports as those costs increase! I and ending my fight, as many others have long ago, and tired of trying to get people to understand that we do not have to accept what happens on other city streets, happening here. What happens is what we allow to happen, and if we sit back and say nothing, it will happen!
Too many lives have been lost, too many families destroyed, too many businesses lost, and too many other losses due to back decisions by leaders with no vision or no will!
Thank God we shut down the SCS and the UCP moved to a treatment and recovery model instead of harm reduction and enabling and encouraging addicts to continue or become addicted, which in just a few years, and with it not fully implemented, has seen over 60% reduction of fatal overdoses in Lethbridge in 2024, and over 45% reduction province wide. Those are hundreds of lives saved and hundreds of families not devastated!
If we said it is happend all over and continued to look at BC, we would look like Vancouver DTES here!
What is lacking now, is the will for law enforcement to clean up the criminals on our streets that continue to commit criminal acts, freely, with no deterrents, which only magnifies the issues! There are laws that exist they can use, but don’t. For those laws that need change, our leadership should be pushing the AB government and the federal government for changes needed. They should be advocating for us, not citizens having to constantly stand up for change!
I have fought for almost 9 years, and it is coming to an end! This is my last battle since many just do not care anymore! Too bad we couldn’t fill the Police Commission meetings every meeting of every month until they listening, but to many people do not think they will be heard.
Many said we wouldn’t be able to shut down the SCS . . . we did and caused more change to happen by pushing for effective treatment programs and encampment strategies ( which now needs to be amended ), so if you are willing to roll up your sleeves, you can bring change!
For me, I am done! Your choice!