An alleged vandal terrorized two suburban Maryland neighborhoods, smashing property and causing thousands of dollars in damage before police arrested him, authorities said.
Nghia Le, 50, allegedly hurled rocks and bricks through house windows and slashed car tires in Greenbelt, a Washington, D.C., suburb. Surveillance video provided to ABC 7 reportedly shows him wearing a balaclava and calmly walking away after each attack.
“I thought I was going to die,” Heather Roman-Stork, who said the repeated vandalism left her terrified, told ABC 7.
The attacks frightened residents so severely that Roman-Stork felt she needed to arm herself for protection.
“I was hiding with my softball bat from high school on the phone with 9-1-1 thinking this is how it ends,” she recalled.
During the first attack on Roman-Stork’s home, broken glass covered the first floor.
After she replaced the damaged windows, Le allegedly returned and struck again.
“I was thinking, he’s back, and maybe this is going to escalate,” Roman-Stork said.
Le was first arrested in connection with the vandalism on Aug. 6 and detained again on Aug. 28. He faces a felony charge of malicious destruction of property valued at more than $1,000.
He later posted bond.
Roman-Stork’s home was attacked twice during the vandalism spree in August.
After she boarded up the shattered first-floor windows with plywood, Le allegedly moved his focus higher, targeting the still-intact windows on the second floor.
Multiple of Roman-Stork’s neighbors were hit in August, one house was allegedly hit three times.
“He had just replaced all the windows in his home when he came back; they were all damaged again,” said Greenbelt police chief Richard Bowers.
Le went on a spree in September three times before he was arrested and held without bond, according to ABC 7.
“I know it’s just property damage, but it’s just property damage until someone is unlucky enough to be in the line of fire of one of these rocks,” said Roman-Stork.
