Got something in self storage? What you need to know amid rising thefts

Artist Tina So moved from Hong Kong to Vancouver two years ago and needed a storage locker for some paintings and family heirlooms.

She signed up with Sentinel Storage in Richmond, B.C., comforted by the promise of a state-of-the-art security system.

That confidence was shaken when So opened her storage unit in August.

“I couldn’t believe my eyes,” she told Go Public. “I double-checked the door. I thought I entered some other person’s locker.”

Her major artwork from the past ten years, other paintings she had collected, family tableware and other heirlooms — all were gone.

“The first thing I did