The survivors of a terrifying random attack at a South Surrey housing community in the middle of the night on Wednesday are sharing the harrowing details of the incident.
Garth Wesnowski and Nicole Tyssedal told Global News they believed the man who turned to violence immediately after they opened their front door could have killed them.
The ordeal unfolded around 1:30 a.m. in the Breakaway Bays community near King George Boulevard and 160th Street.
Wesnoski said he’d gone to the door believing his father-in-law, who has dementia, had wandered outside.
“As soon as I touched the door, my life changed,” he said.
“Then it just became a fight. I could see nothing. I honestly couldn’t tell you what this fella looked like to this day, it was just a blur.”
The brawl took Wesnoski and his attacker off his front deck and down to the driveway.
He said he heard the sound of breaking glass and feared he was going to get stabbed.
“The first thing that went through my mind is that I’ve got to help Garth because I could see he was covered in blood and I was afraid he was going to kill him — so I tried to come to his aid. I mean, he was a big man, but I tried to just get in there and help,” Tyssedal said.
“But I knew even the two of us couldn’t overpower him.”
The attacker kept yelling that he wanted car keys, and Tyssedal said she agreed to get him hers if he would leave Wesnoski alone.
“She said I will give you keys,” Wesknoski said. “And I could hear him, like, ‘I’m gonna keep hitting, I’m gonna kill him if you don’t.’”
The man followed her back up to the house — unbeknownst to Tyssedal but captured by CCTV, carrying a bottle.
“I was afraid. I felt him behind me, but when I saw the video, he had that … it has a different impact on me now,” she said.
When Tyssedal was unable to find her keys in the darkness and chaos, the couple says he instead tried to break into two other nearby homes.
Wesnoski said he managed to escape without any broken bones or stab wounds but suffered multiple cuts and bruises.
The couple both carry the psychological scars of the attack.
“It’s just day by day right now. I mean, it’s fresh right now. But I don’t want to live in fear, because I have never lived in fear,” Tyssedal said, adding the couple would “get through it together.”
“She’s a strong woman,” Wesnoski said.
David William Charles Hoffman was charged on Wednesday with two counts of breaking and entering, assault, two counts of mischief under $5,000 and one count of breaching a release order.
He’s due back in court for a bail hearing on March 3.