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Smash and grab leaves wedding photog reeling

Vancouver wedding photographer Jourdan Tymkow was devastated Sunday night to discover her laptop with thousands of her clients’ wedding photos had been stolen while she was shooting another wedding, at Burnaby Lake Rowing Pavilion.
bag
This is the same type of bag wedding photographer Jourdan Tymkow had stolen from a silver Toyota Sunday night. The computer in the bag contained thousands of photographs from two recent weddings. Photograph by contributed.

Vancouver wedding photographer Jourdan Tymkow was devastated Sunday night to discover her laptop with thousands of her clients’ wedding photos had been stolen while she was shooting another wedding, at Burnaby Lake Rowing Pavilion.

About 2,000 of the photos were from two weddings Tymkow shot over the last two weeks — and they weren’t backed up.

Tymkow, 23, left her backpack containing her MacBook with the photos on it in the back of the silver Toyota she was travelling in, which was parked in the Pavilion parking lot.

She went into the reception at 6:30 and came back out at 7:30 to get a lens from the backpack and nothing was amiss, she said, though she saw many people milling about the parking lot who didn’t appear to be part of the wedding. When she came out for the final time at 10:30 p.m. the rear window of the Toyota was smashed and the backpack was gone.

“I totally had a breakdown,” she said Monday, her voice breaking with emotion. “I have been pretty much crying ever since.”

She immediately reported the theft to the Burnaby RCMP who told her to check local pawnshops and Craigslist to see if the bag and computer shows up.

While the theft means a loss of thousands of dollars for Tymkow, it is the thought of the people who will be impacted by the loss of the photos that makes her most upset.

“There was hundreds of people at the weddings, like family and friends and all the photos of them with the bride and groom and the bride and groom themselves,” she said.

Tymkow said she usually backs up her photos right away, but didn’t the last two times. The last wedding took place at a campsite, so she wasn’t able to.

“Just the worst timing,” she said.

So far, she hasn’t alerted the two brides of the news.

She said she is hoping the computer will be recovered quickly so she can pass on the photos to the newlyweds without them having to go through the stress of the loss.

If the photos aren’t found, she will contact the couples next week.

This is her first season as a wedding photographer.

It is also the first time she has ever had anything stolen.

“I don’t understand stealing something that is of no value to someone else,” she said.

She said if the thief returns the computer to her there will be no questions asked.

“I would be ecstatic if they came forward,” she said.

Tymkow is asking anyone who finds her older black Herschel backpack, with some exercise clothing and a white 2005 MacBook inside to contact her by phone at 778-251-8445.

She is offering a $500 reward for the return of the photos.

Anyone with information can also contact the Burnaby RCMP at 604-294-7922.

 

Thuncher@shaw.ca