Burgalry suspect runs right by me

Yesterday is an example of why I love my job. I had just gotten in to the newsroom after a day of gathering news. Arrests, and overnight burglaries, the usual stuff. Then as I always do I sat down in front of Bob's desk to tell him what I had done for the day and what I would have for the news that night. This was a little after 2 in the afternoon. I had just started talking to Bob when he heard a "burglary in progress" call over the police scanner. Not that unusual, I was half way paying attention to the scanner and continued to talk to Bob.

Then, if you know Officer Jim Craft, with the Abilene Police Department, then you would recognize his voice on the scanner, and if you have ever listened to a police scanner then you would know when an officer is running after someone. Well we heard Craft say over the scanner something about what direction a suspect was running. We could tell Craft was running after him. I jumped up from the chair in front of Bob's desk, ran into the other room in the news room, grabbed a portable scanner and ran to my car and headed to green street.

On my way I could here that the police had lost the suspects (I latter found out that Officer Craft had to stop the foot chase because he had pulled a hamstring) and they were calling a K-9 to come in and try to track them. The K-9 officer had gotten to the scene just a few seconds before I did, and while the dog had picked up a scent and was following it, other officers were driving the area looking for the two suspects, so I did the same thing. Then I heard on the scanned that the dog had followed the scent to a home just down the block from where the break-in took place, so that is where I went. Police surrounded the house because not only did the dog track to the area, they also found a hat on the back porch of the house that one of the suspects was wearing.

From that point there was a lot of standing around while police were trying to find out who lived in the home and they were working on a warrant to go in to see if the two suspects were actually in the home.

As I waited and police had the house surrounded I decided to walk back to the house where the break-in took place to see if I could interview the home owner. I had seen her standing outside her home when I arrived so I new was at home. What I did not know till I talked to her is that she was home when the two suspects went into the take her t.v. and that the suspects new she was home.

She locked herself in a bedroom when she heard her back window break and saw someone come inside. According the girl in the home, the suspect saw her and still came into the house. So she told me about that and I walked back to the home that police had surrounded. One officer was in the back, and there were Town in the front. I stood across the street from the home and just waited. That is when I heard an officer say "I saw him peak out of the blinds."

Just a few minutes after that I heard another officer say "he's running!"

I turned to look and saw a young kid running from the front door of the home. He ran across the street right by me, across a yard and over the back fence into another back yard, and over that fence. I new he was headed to the creek so I jumped in my car and headed that direction. That is where I saw Officer Craft who was parked on the side of the creek. I parked behind him and got out of my car as he was getting out of his, and that's when we saw the suspect run down the creek and try to hide in some tall grass. Craft told him to get down when the suspect realized he had been seen and he popped back up, and thought about running again. Craft pulled his Taser and told the suspect to get down but he would not comply. After several warnings, the officer finally had to take the suspect down himself and handcuff him.

That's why I love my job, because a normal day can turn into something like this in an instant!