Former employee charged with vandalism and trespassing after slashing foreman’s Cadillac tires and boss’ lawnmower at Pepperell storage facility

PEPPERELL — On Friday, August 23, 2024, at around 12:23 p.m., Officer Daniel Adams and Lieutenant Jay Friend of the Pepperell Police Department responded to a reported disturbance involving vandalism at Stateline Self Storage, located at 173 Nashua Road.

(The account and quotations in this article were sourced from the printed Personnel Narrative of Officer Adams and do not reflect any political perspective or personal opinion of News Link Live, which is strictly a business entity.)

“The reporting party, Jason [last name redacted], reported that a former employee, who had been recently let go, returned to their storage site and sliced the tires of the foreman’s vehicle,” Officer Adams said. “The vehicle, a 2000 Cadillac Seville owned by Brian [last name redacted] was parked at the site while they were out of the area on another job.”

Jason, the owner of Unlimited Landscape & Site LLC, stores equipment at Stateline Self Storage. He told Officer Adams that as a current employee arrived at their storage site, he witnessed a former employee, later identified as James Demers, pulling his hand away from the rear tire of a Cadillac. When the current employee approached Demers, he fled the area in a black Honda, heading toward Hollis, New Hampshire.

According to police, James R. Demers, 46, is a resident of 14B Blossom Street, Nashua, New Hampshire.

“The witness was able to positively ID that the suspect was in fact James Demers and confirmed that James was the one who had sliced all four tires of the Cadillac,” Officer Adam said. Later adding, “I looked at all the tires that were vandalized, it appeared that James used a knife to slice the sidewall of each tire.”

Officer Adams had the employees check the rest of the work site to see if anything else was damaged.

“One employee later found that one of their ride-on lawn mowers also had both tires slashed,” Officer Adams said.

Officer Adams stated that Jason owns the lawn mower. Jason informed him that the tires, which were recently replaced, cost approximately $300 each.

While speaking with Jason, Officer Adams said that Brian, the foreman, arrived on scene to inspect his car.

“Brian walked over to the car and stated that James must have done this because he had to recently let him go as there was conflict with the owners,” Officer Adams said. “Brian stated that the value of the tires was approximately $1,200.00 and he would now need to replace every one, and also get the vehicle towed to a shop for repairs.”

Officer Adams added, “Due to James fleeing the area before police arrival, we were unable to speak with him and ask him about the incident. Jason was able to get me information on James from his previously application from Unlimited Landscape & Site.”

Officer Adams reported that James was explicitly instructed not to return to the property when he was fired from Unlimited Landscape & Site, LLC.

“It should also be noted, the day that James was let go from Unlimited Landscape & Site, he was told to not come back on the property,” Officer Adams said. “James also ignored that from the property owner and trespassed on to the property to cause permanent damage to vehicles and equipment.”

Demers was charged with:

• Wanton Destruction of property +$1,200
• Wanton Destruction of property -$1,200
• Trespass

Disclaimer: If you are wondering why the incident in this story was from August, that’s because I had to file FOIA request(s) to get the court documents for the incident. FOIAs are time consuming.

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