First he’s targeted by a thief, and then slashed by a knife. It’s all part of a rough two weeks for a local bike courier, and it all surrounds the very bike he uses to do his job.
Roger Leszczynski is a bike messenger for a company in downtown San Diego. He said the first crime happened about two weeks ago when a thief followed him into a parking garage at a hotel near the Embarcadero, cut the lock and stole his bike.
“These thieves around here are high tech these days, they’re scouting you out,” Leszczynski said.
Leszczynski said his bike is rare, specialized and easy to spot, so he knew it was his when he saw a man riding it a few weeks later down the Embarcadero.
“I stopped him, held onto the handle bars, and asked him questions,” he said.
But Leszczynski said he wasn’t getting the answers he was looking for, and the man instead pulled a knife, slashed his hand and kept on swinging the knife.
“I see the jabbing motion toward my chest with the object and that’s when I jump away,” he said. “I said, ‘someone call the police, someone call the police, help, help!’”
Leszczynski said he still hasn’t gotten his bike back, and has had to buy an emergency bike to do his job in the meantime.
He has reported both crimes to San Diego Police.
