Yukon MP wrestles sign-defacing vandal to ground in citizen arrest

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Tension runs high on the campaign trail, whether it is on a paved urban boulevard or a rainy stretch of remote northern highway.

After discovering a slew of destroyed campaign signs, Yukon MP (and former cage fighter) Ryan Leef took matters into his own hands, searching for a late-night vandal along part of the Alaska highway.

“No way am I going to look at these gaudy signs until October!” wrote the admitted vandal, Carrie Boles, in a letter to the Yukon News. Boles says she wanted to cut Leef’s name out of the signs, so she could see the trees while she rode her bike home.

“I just finished ‘altering’ my third small sign … and was moving onto my fourth when I heard a rumble in the bushes behind me,” wrote Boles.

Boles says she was then approached by two men, one balding and dressed all in black, the other in camouflage. The woman wrote that with her arm was twisted behind her back and she was forced to the ground, while the men yelled “Citizen’s arrest, citizen’s arrest, you are being placed under citizen’s arrest!”

The camo-clad figure was identified as Leef, who was first elected in 2011, reports the National Post.

Tampering with campaign signs is a criminal act and vandals can be charged, but Boles, who admits she has not voted in more than 10 years, was unaware of the possible charges. Boles had also already destroyed some of Leef’s signs during a prior excursion.

The National Post reports that Leef chose not to press charges, and instead urged Boles to work out her frustrations by working with a political party.