Vandals Puncture Tires on 50 South Berkeley Cars Along One-Mile Stretch of Street

Geoff Logan of Berkeley fixes a fat tire on his BMW 2002 on Wednesday Aug. 31. Both of his tires on his car and tires on two other family cars were punctured by vandals Wednesday morning.

By Doug Oakley

Staff Writer

Bay Area News Group

doakley@bayareanewsgroup.com

Tires on about 50 cars in south Berkeley were punctured by a vandal or vandals early Wednesday morning on a one-mile stretch of California Street, police said.

Residents awoke to find one or more tires on their cars flattened from California and Blake streets all the way down to 62nd Street, police said. Tires were punctured on Julia and King streets as well.

Berkeley Police Spokeswoman Sgt. Mary Kusmiss said four police officers and a supervisor spent five hours checking for punctured car tires in the area Wednesday morning.

"We have seen a fair amount of anger, frustration, disbelief and surprise out here this morning," said Kusmiss.

Geoff Logan of Berkeley, who owns a BMW, had two of his car's tires punctured on California Street. He said his father came outside at about 5:30 a.m. and noticed three of the family's cars had flat tires.

Police have no suspects.

"This kind of crime can be committed so quickly under cover of darkness," Kusmiss said. "But we hope someone will call in and tell us they saw someone doing it and give us a description."

Doug Oakley covers Berkeley. Contact him at 510-843-1408. Follow him at Twitter.com/douglasoakley