VICTORIA -- On Tuesday morning, a warehouse owned by the popular Dodd’s furniture brand became the target of crime once again.

At around 7:30 a.m., management staff and owner Gordy Dodd received alerts about a break-in at the back of the company’s Garbally Road property.

Dodd and another manager rushed to the building and found the alleged burglars still inside.

“He was standing right there,” said warehouse supervisor Wolfe Alpen, as he pointed to a chain link door with an arm-sized hole cut below the lock.

“When he saw me, he ran,” said Alpen.

At the same time, Dodd himself was able to spot a group of men that he believed were involved in the break-in. The furniture salesman and philanthropist says he walked up to them and asked them if they were the perpetrators.

“I asked them, ‘Did you break in?’” Dodd told CTV News.

“He said, ‘We did it,’ and he showed me his (middle) finger.”

The Dodd’s organization says the thieves made off with several thousand dollars worth of electronic equipment and caused minor damage to the property.

But, operators of the local business say that what concerns them most is not this specific crime, but the general rash of crimes that have recently plagued the business and other stores in the area.

Last week, the Gorge-area business spoke out publicly about a rise in crime and drug use in the community following the high-profile government purchase of a nearby hotel for use as a temporary homeless shelter.

Dodd says that since then, his business has dealt with vandalism, graffiti, lewd acts and now break-ins.

He is now calling on all levels of government to find a solution for the crime wave washing over the Victoria community.

Dodd claims that proper support services for the tenants of the hotels were not in place when they were rushed into the newly established shelters during the pandemic.

While businesses in the area have seen a rise in crime, BC Housing tells CTV News that it believes that the people who are responsible for the break-ins are not tenants of the government’s new temporary shelters.

Victoria police have arrested one person they say is involved in the warehouse break and enter. The investigation is ongoing.

Victoria’s crime epicentre shifts from downtown to Burnside Gorge area, say police

At the onset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, Victoria’s police department began closely monitoring crime statistics by neighbourhood. According to its latest data, an interesting shift has taken place.

The city’s epicentre of property and violent crime is almost exclusively located in the Burnside Gorge community.

“That is something we are definitely paying attention to and it's unusual for us,” said Victoria Police Department spokesperson Bowen Osoko.

“That is unusual for that neighbourhood,” he said.

Victoria Police say weekly statistics for property and violent crime have consistently shown the Burnside Gorge area faces the highest call volumes.

Police had expected downtown Victoria to see a slight dip in calls due to the lack of visitors. However, the police department says it was surprised to find another community had become a similar, or often worse, crime hub amid the pandemic.