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Man kidnapped, robbed at Atlanta Home Depot www.privateofficer.com
Source:WSBTV.com — Police are searching for two gunmen who abducted a 71-year-old man from the parking lot of a Home Depot in southwest Atlanta.
It happened at the Home Depot at 1032 Research Center Drive on Saturday morning.
James Smith told Channel 2 Action News reporter Ryan Young that the ordeal all began when the men asked for a shopping cart.
“Guy says, ‘I’ll take that if you’re finished with it,’” said Smith.
Smith said then two black men with handguns forced him into his car in the parking lot of the Home Depot.
The gunmen forced Smith to drive to the Bank of America at Cascade Road and Donnelly Avenue and withdraw $2,000.
Smith told police that the gunmen then ordered him to drive to another Bank of America, where he was forced him to withdraw $2,500 from a teller.
The thieves also stole Smith’s watch and a class ring.
“He blindfolded me, put a gag in my mouth and tied my hands. I said, ‘please don’t hurt me … I got a wife and five kids and 10 grandkids and two great-grand kids. Please don’t hurt me”
They eventually released Smith on Cascade Road.
Smith told police that the gunmen escaped in a blue/gray Dodge Stratus.
Kidnap victim pounces on gunman, saves family www.privateofficer.com
Kidnap victim pounces on gunman, saves family http://www.privateofficer.com
washingtonpost.com
Speeding on the Capital Beltway, James Spruill knew he had to act fast. His wife and boys were packed into the family car, and a masked man was in the back seat, jabbing a loaded gun into his 11-year-old son’s ribs.
Twelve hours earlier, two gunmen had forced their way into his Prince George’s County home. Spruill said they tied him and his wife up with cords from a clock radio and a PlayStation, holding them overnight in separate bedrooms and keeping the two children in a third. The men had said they would hold the boys hostage and use his wife, an assistant bank manager, to rob her branch in the morning.
“I wasn’t sure what was going to happen,” Spruill said. “A lot of times, criminals don’t leave witnesses.”
Spruill had gotten lucky once. The gunmen allowed him to drive to the bank. Then, about 7:30 a.m. yesterday, within a few miles of the target, Spruill got another break: In his rearview mirror, he saw a Maryland State Police car approaching quickly on the Beltway’s outer loop near Route 1.
Spruill, 40, began to swerve his red Mitsubishi Gallant slightly. The one gunman who accompanied them didn’t notice — but Trooper Barrington Cameron did.
Cameron, a 22-year-old rookie, pulled the car over and walked to the passenger side, where Spruill’s wife was seated. Spruill glanced back at his son, tilting his head to motion the boy away from the gunman.
In an instant, Spruill was in the back seat, pinning the man’s hands and screaming about the gun. The trooper pulled his weapon, and the ordeal was over.
Late yesterday, the suspect was in custody and a search was on for the other man. Spruill, a maintenance worker with Metro, his wife and children — the 11-year-old and his 8-year-old brother — were back in their home in Clinton, shaken but unhurt
He put his family first, jumping on the guy with the gun,” said Lt. Carl Miller, commander of the College Park barracks. “He did what most people would have done with their families bound up like that. Whether they would have done it to that degree, I don’t know.”
Spruill described the ordeal in an interview, denying the mantle of hero but saying he played “psychological games” with his family’s abductors and gained advantages that made the difference.
“They were a bunch of amateurs,” he said.
The attempted bank robbery, though unusual, comes three months after a similar attempted robbery in Southern Maryland. Both involved a scheme taken straight from the plot of Hollywood thrillers.
Police said yesterday that the assailants timed their attack as the 39-year-old woman returned home from her bank, a SunTrust branch in Silver Spring. At 7:30 p.m., as she entered the house in the 6800 block of Briarcliff Drive, they pounced.
Spruill said he was in the bedroom, preparing for work, when his wife called out. He rushed to the front room, where he saw two men wearing ski masks, one holding a gun to his wife’s head. The men tied up the husband and wife, separating them, and forced the boys into their parents’ bedroom.
The assailants spoke to their hostages in English but communicated with each other in Spanish. Spruill, bound in one of the boy’s bedrooms, said he stayed awake all night, planning and listening as the men rummaged through his kitchen.
“It was like in the movies,” he said. “You just had to think it all through and figure it out. I wanted to keep us all together.”
In the morning, the assailants said one of them would stay at the house with the boys while the other went to the bank with Spruill and his wife.
Spruill fabricated a story to keep the family together. He told the men that his aunt was expected to visit that morning. He told them that if he was forced to call her to cancel the visit, he would find a way to let her know the family was in danger.
The assailants were fooled into changing their plan. The whole family would go to the bank, they decided. But there wasn’t room for both would-be robbers in the car, so one would stay behind.
They headed for the bank, at Elton Road and New Hampshire Avenue. Spruill sped for much of 25 miles, hoping to get pulled over.
When Cameron flipped his lights on, the assailant pulled off his mask, showing his face for the first time. He instructed Spruill to tell the officer that they were headed to breakfast together
On the right shoulder, approaching on the side away from traffic, Cameron asked for his license. Trying to alert the trooper that something was amiss, Spruill handed him his bank card. Cameron had by then noticed that someone in the back seat was making “suspicious movements,” police said.
Cameron asked for his license again. Spruill unbuckled his seat belt and lunged.
After the traffic stop, state police and Prince George’s police surrounded the house, concerned that the second assailant might have a hostage inside. About four hours later, police stormed into the house, finding
Detectives spent part of yesterday working with county police and federal authorities to identify the suspect apprehended in the car. He gave state police interrogators multiple names after his arrest, and police initially described him only as in his teens or early 20s.
About five hours after he was taken to the College Park barracks, the suspect attempted to hang himself by tying his shirt around his neck and to his cell door, police said.
Miller, the commander of the barracks, said the suspect was spotted quickly and cut down by a duty officer before he suffered any injuries. Miller said he was being held overnight at Prince George’s County Hospital Center for a psychological evaluation.
Miller said little is known about the second assailant. He was described as black, 5-foot-7 and 160 pounds and was last seen wearing dark pants and black hooded sweat shirt.
A state police forensics team spent several hours combing through the family’s home. Miller said those samples had not led to an identification last night.
On Sept. 24, a Southern Maryland bank manager and her two young children were abducted at gunpoint from their home. The suspects drove the woman to the PNC Bank she managed in St. Mary’s County and held one of her children hostage while she went inside to get money out of the vault.
The next month, police charged three men and a woman, alleging that they secretly followed the bank manager for several weeks and planned the abduction and robbery. Police recovered about $110,000 of the $168,000 stolen, much of it buried in two safes in the back yard of one of the suspects.
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Wal-Mart customer kidnapped, stabbed during robbery www.privateofficer.com
Wal-Mart customer kidnapped, stabbed during robbery http://www.privateofficer.com
NTL. ASSOC. PRIVATE OFFICERS
http://www.privateofficer.com/ – A 67-year-old man was kidnapped and stabbed in a Wal-Mart parking lot Thursday night, according to the Sheriff’s Department.
The attacker, who was arrested a short time later, is in jail Friday on suspicion of attempted murder and kidnapping, deputies said.
The man had just bought some milk at the store on Community Road, north of Poway Road, and was walking home about 9:15 p.m. when he was confronted by the attacker at the intersection of Hilleary Place and Midland Road, said sheriff’s Sgt. Keith Griggs.
The kidnapper stuck a gun in the man’s back and said if he didn’t come with him, the kidnapper would kill him, Griggs said.
He forced the man back to the store parking lot and took him behind some large shipping containers, the sergeant said.
“He thought the guy was going to kill him,” Griggs said.
The victim fought with his abductor and was able to get the gun away, which ended up under one of the containers, the sergeant said.
He then ran away, but the attacker caught up with him in the Wal-Mart parking lot and another struggle ensued, Griggs said.
A store security guard saw the altercation and called sheriff’s deputies, who arrived quickly and set up a perimeter around the area, the sergeant said.
Deputies found Jose Aparacio Mendoza, 42, on the north side of the parking lot and the victim identified him as the attacker, Griggs said.
Mendoza was arrested and booked into jail in San Diego.
The victim, who was stabbed in the hand and thigh, was treated at a hospital and released.
Griggs said the man did not know the attacker and the motive is unknown. A knife and the gun, which turned out to be a pellet gun, were recovered by deputies.
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Woman kidnapped student to prove lax school security www.privateofficer.com
Woman kidnapped child to prove lax school security http://www.privateofficer.com
The women’s motive was to prove how lax security is at Mackey, North Las Vegas police said.
Police accused two friends, 40-year-old Laurinda Drake and 40-year-old Elaine Clermont, of participating in the student’s kidnapping. Police said Drake picked up the boy near the school, at 2726 Englestad Street in North Las Vegas, and drove him to different locations, including a Wal-Mart store and Clermont’s house.
Police said the boy was picked up at 9:30 a.m. and turned over at noon to officials at the district’s administrative center, 5100 W. Sahara Ave.
Police said the women called media outlets so that reporters would be at the district’s headquarters when the boy was turned over.
“This was to show that someone can easily remove a child from the school without proper safety measures,” police said in a statement.
Police did not say whether Drake or Clermont had any relationship to the kidnapped boy.
Superintendent Walt Rulffes called the incident “bizarre.” Rulffes said he did not think the women had any relationship with the boy in the incident.
“We don’t know all the details, but it certainly is not appropriate to pick up children going to and from school when not authorized by parents,” he said.
Drake, but not Clermont, was being held at the North Las Vegas jail Monday evening, said a woman who answered the phone at the jail. She did not want to be named.
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Kidnap, rape suspect released by court after shoplifting arrest www.privateofficer.com
Kidnap, rape suspect arrested for shoplifting and released by court http://www.privateofficer.com
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Police capture man wanted for kidnapping domestic violence worker www.privateofficer.com
Police capture man wanted for kidnapping domestic violence worker http://www.privateofficer.com
William Dorris Irwin was captured after Rutherford County’s Fugitive Squad tracked him to Memphis.
Police say that it all started Monday morning when he is accused of kidnapping a woman in Murfreesboro and then threatening to kidnap his son from Smyrna high school
Irwin’s wife, who has an order of protection against him, was in the parking lot of the Murfreesboro Domestic Violence Center on Monday talking to a counselor when police said Irwin suddenly showed up.
According to police, Irwin then took the domestic violence worker and dropped her off at a Citgo gas station in Smyrna, but not before telling the worker he was going to kidnap his 16-year-old son from Smyrna High School.
The worker immediately called police, prompting the high school not to allow anyone in or out of the building.
“There was no imminent danger on campus this morning. There was no one that actually ever entered the campus with any sort of guns. This was completely off-campus and they (executed a lockdown) as a way of keeping the campus secure,” said James Evans, spokesman for Rutherford County schools.
School was let out at its normal time on Monday.
Irwin’s son and the boy’s mother are together and both are currently in a safe location according to area authorities.
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Woman kidnapped from NC Walmart www.privateofficer.com
Woman kidnapped from NC Walmart http://www.privateofficer.com
Police investigators are reviewing security camera video from the Wal-Mart parking lot where Copelin was kidnapped. She says she only hopes parking lot security cameras got a better look at her attackers than she did.
It happened Tuesday night around 10 p.m. at the Wal-Mart in the 4600-block of Ramsey Street. They grabbed the 60-year-old grandmother while she was putting groceries in her car.
“I just can’t imagine doing anything like that to anybody,” Copelin said. “When they stuck the gun in the back of my head I didn’t even hardly breathe I was so scared
Copelin says she was kidnapped while she was loading groceries into her car. She says three women forced her into her car demanding money.
“They put the gun to the back of my head and said they wanted cash. I told them all I had was $18,” Copelin said.
She says the suspect made her drive to an ATM on Rowan Street, ordered her at gunpoint to give them her pin numbers, and used her debit card to withdraw cash.
The 40 minutes of terror ended near the intersection of Mechanic and Moore Streets, when the suspects threw her car keys to the floor and fled, taking more than just her money.
“And they ripped my rings off my fingers. My husband is deceased they took my wedding rings, then they took a ring my mother gave me when I was a kid,” she said.”They took my self esteem.”
Through it all Copelin says she prayed they wouldn’t kill her, and says her faith touched one of the kidnappers.
“When she got out she said, ‘you prayed that we would not kill you, God answered your prayer’ and she said, ‘I think you must be a Christian, will you pray for me?’” Copelin said.
Copelin says they made off with about 500 in cash, a GPS in her car and her jewelry. All three female suspects fled on foot.
Copelin could only give police partial descriptions of her attackers.
Investigators need the public’s help, they asking anyone with information to call the Fayetteville Police Department at (910) 433-1896 or CRIMESTOPPERS at 483-TIPS/483-8477.
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Kidnapping, possible murder thwarted by alert police officer www.privateofficer.com
Kidnapping, possible murder thwarted by alert police officer http://www.privateofficer.com
Officer Michael Baker was patrolling the Five Oaks neighborhood about 12:15 p.m. Wednesday when he spotted the men. When the men saw Baker, they dropped their prisoner and ran, said Lt. John Huber.
A fourth suspect was spotted running from the house and officers gave chase by said that man got way even though Officer Charles Hurley shot him with a stun gun.
“Whatever was going to happen in there wasn’t going to be good,” Huber said.
He added that Baker probably saved the handcuffed man’s life.
The handcuffed man had minor head injuries and looked as if he had been pistol-whipped, Huber said.
Police are still investigating this incident and searching for the men who got away.
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Police officer, girlfriend guilty of rape www.privateofficer.com
TACOMA, Wash. Nov. 26 2007
– A retired Tacoma Police officer and his girlfriend pleaded guilty to child rape and molestation charges Monday morning.
Lee William Giles, Jr. and Maureen Wear face at least 20 years in prison, and Giles could end up behind bars for life. Police say that during their investigation officer giles retired and was arrested soon after.
Both pleaded guilty to first- and second-degree child rape, first-degree molestation and third-degree child assault.
Prosecutors contend the Giles and Wear molested young relatives for years and videotaped some of the abuse.
The victims told prosecutors they supported the plea deals.
Wear will be sentenced in late December. Giles will be sentenced January 4.
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Shoplifter steals car with children in it www.privateofficer.com
Shoplifter steals car with children in it www.privateofficer.com
Greece, N.Y. Nov. 19 2007– Police have apprehended a shoplifting suspect wanted for stealing a car with two children inside from the parking lot at the BJ’s Wholesale Club on Bellwood Drive in Greece.
Greece Police said, shortly before 8 p.m. Thursday, store security confronted Geraldine Motzer, 41, of Brockport, in a car after she left the store with a television set.
As the car’s driver spoke to security, Motzer got in a mini van that was running as the owner was loading it with groceries. She then took off in the van with two children inside.
Motzer dropped the children off on a porch at a home in Rochester. The homeowners called 911 to report that the children were there.
Rochester Police helped find the mini-van and Motzer was arrested.
Motzer faces several charges including robbery, grand larceny, kidnapping, and reckless endangerment.
She is currently on parole for grand larceny and has been remanded to Monroe County Jail without bail.
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Shoplifter kidnaps shopper during escape by; Rick McCann www.privateofficer.com
Shoplifter kidnaps shopper during escape by; Rick McCann www.privateofficer.com
Gilroy police late Friday were searching for a man they say kidnapped a woman after carjacking her vehicle on Camino Arroyo in the Kohl’s department store parking lot.
About 6 p.m., a security officer called police to report that a man had entered Kohl’s at 6765 Camino Arroyo and had begun stealing cologne.
The security officer followed the man outside. When the man noticed the security officer, he began running toward Mimi’s Cafe, about 100 yards away. With the security officer in pursuit, the man got into the front passenger side of a small gray sport-utility vehicle with a woman in the driver’s seat, said Sgt. Jim Gillio.
The security officer told police the woman threw her arms into the air and screamed, “What’s going on, what’s going on?” When the man started the car and put the vehicle in gear, the woman yelled, “Help me, help,” as he forced her to drive the car away, Gillio said.
The security officer chased the SUV on foot, but was unable to stop it.
The SUV had a license plate similar to 5ASV516 and a spare tire attached to the rear door. It was last seen heading west on 10th Street, possibly to Highway 101.
The suspect is described as Latino between 25 and 30 years old, about 5-foot-10 and 180 pounds, with black hair, and a slight beard. He was wearing a black baseball cap with a white emblem, a green short-sleeve shirt with a white t-shirt underneath,black baggy pants, and white tennis shoes. The victim was a Latina in her 30s with dark shoulder-length hair. Police had not located a suspect, victim or vehicle late Friday.
Anyone with information was asked to call Gilroy police at (408) 846-0350.
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Man molested girl in Walmart store www.privateofficer.com
Man attacks young girl in Walmart by; Rick McCann www.privateofficer.com
HYBLA VALLEY, Va. Oct. 23 2007 – An Alexandria man has been charged with molesting a 9-year-old girl in a Fairfax County Wal-Mart.
Police say the incident took place shortly after 3 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 20 at the store at 7910 Richmond Highway.
Fairfax County police say Jaime Francisco Calacan Jr., 36, of Alexandria told the girl that he was a police officer and that he had to check her pockets for stolen merchandise, but while doing so, he molested her.
The girl kicked the man in the groin and ran to her mother. Police say the girl was not injured.
She notified store security, who called police. Loss prevention agents made a search of the store looking for the alledged attacker and with the aid of local police were able to take the suspect into custody. Calacan was arrested inside the store.
Calacan is charged with abduction, two counts of animate object sexual penetration, aggravated sexual battery and impersonating a police officer.
A Wal-Mart spokesman says the company takes such incidents seriously and works with police to ensure customers’ safety.
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