The Day I Flirted an Armed Robber into Custody (Pt 2)
Part 2 of 2
This post orginally appeared in January 2024 as an early story in my memoir PET TRACKER. This is Part 2. If you missed Part 1, you can find it here.
“Excuse me, excuse me,” I said politely, using the most feminine voice I could muster.
The robbery suspect stopped in his tracks. With my driver’s window down, I waved my hand in a princess-like wave. I wanted to appear as dumb, as sweet, and as harmless as possible. He was rigid at first, as if ready to bolt. But my unconventional sugar-sweet approach apparently threw him off his thug-life thought process.
“Hey, sweetie,” I continued in a sexy, flirtatious tone that would’ve made my friend Margie proud. I doubted that any police officer had ever used a term of endearment to address a suspected felon before. “I need to ask you a question. Can we chat?”
Frozen at first, the suspect gradually relaxed. He even smiled slightly. I suspect that he thought that I was the dumbest cop who’d ever set foot on the sidewalks of Reedley, California. He likely figured I was clueless that he was the same robbery suspect who the entire Reedley force had been pursuing just an hour before.
“Sure,” was all he said as I rolled my patrol car to a stop in a driveway right in front of him, blocking his path. I had already pulled my Colt .45 out of my holster with my right hand and was pointing it at him directly below my open window, just out of his view.
“How’re you doing tonight?” I stalled as I smiled sweetly and started to step out of my patrol car. But as I took my foot off of the brake, something unexpected happened; my car started to roll forward, nearly knocking me to the ground! To my utter dismay, but totally in line with my occasional bumbling Deputy Sheriff Barney Fife persona from The Andy Griffith Show, I had neglected to put my patrol car into park.
“Oops!” I said with a nervous giggle. “Hang on a sec.”
For a moment, things felt awkward and I wondered if my plan was going to backfire. I was right-handed, but my right hand was busy with a death grip on my unholstered gun. Yet with some creative maneuvering, I managed to use my left hand to shift my car from drive to park while keeping my gun hand concealed from view, thankfully without squeezing the trigger!
With my patrol car safely at a standstill, I pushed the driver’s door open, climbed out, leveled my gun center mass at the robber’s chest, and shouted, “Get on the ground!” I added a few spicy street words that may have started with the letter “F” before declaring, “Or I’ll kill you!”
I meant it. He believed it. And that was all that mattered.
He had a knife in his right hand and I ordered him to drop it, which he did. He shook his head as if to say he couldn’t believe he’d been duped by a female rookie. He complied with my commands and lay flat on the ground, probably because when I repeated the “Or I’ll kill you” part a second time, my gun hand was shaking. A lot.
I knew better than to try and handcuff him alone without another officer there so, I told the dispatcher I had the suspect at gunpoint. That’s when I heard sirens in the distance. Within minutes, help arrived. After we took the suspect into custody and he was locked in my patrol car, the sergeant pulled me aside.
“How’d you do that?” the sergeant asked me with an incredulous tone. It was as if he couldn’t believe that I had the guts or brains to take a felony suspect into custody. When I told him about my out-of-the-box, creative-flirting method the sergeant told me flatly, “Don’t ever do anything that stupid again!”
I still believe that my tactical flirting arrest technique was both clever and creative, certainly not “stupid.” Having a creative mind is one of the best tools that God blessed me with that I would use during my eight-year career as a police officer. He gave me creativity as a weapon, one that I carried on patrol those years and that protected me as much as my Kevlar vest did.
My creativity is a gifting that also followed me through my years of pioneering the “pet detective industry.” It is a gift that God is using in me today as He guides my into my newest venture—creating a pet memorial site / tourist attraction. More to follow on that project in my next post.
I read this the first time you posted it, but it was so good I had to read it again.
The male libido is an amazing force. It will cause us to do things that are clearly against our survival instincts. He knew in his head that you were trouble, and yet he was powerless to resist.