Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Amateur Security Guard

I thought I should set the record straight about my apprehension of the shop lifter. :)

At the end of my senior year, I worked in Hill's department store in Lexington, Kentucky. I worked as a cashier part of the time, but then was put behind the Returns desk. In our store, we had several security personnel. One of them was a very large man who used to do amateur boxing. The other was a very small man who could slink around the store without being noticed. I became friends with them both, and would talk to them occasionally. I do remember that sometimes they would get mad at me for talking to them while they were following someone in the store. lol I thought their job was very exciting, and I used to tell them that I would help them if they wanted. I had been studying martial arts, and I guess I thought I was pretty tough and could make a great security guard. lol My chance soon came.

One night I was standing behind the desk when the big guy came walking quickly up to the desk and said, "Follow me." I didn't question him, I just followed him. We walked out front of the store and started following another man. The security guard went up to him and said, "Hey man, what you got there?" The man was carrying a jacket over his shoulder. The Security guy starting reaching to look at what the man had. The man pushed him and threw the coat at him and started running. (I seem to remember some tools dropping) It was drizzling outside, so the pavement was wet. As soon as he started running, the shoplifter slipped and fell. The security officer recovered from being pushed and started running after the shoplifter. But at this point the shoplifter got up, and the security guard slipped. I started running after the shoplifter. To my surprise, the shoplifter slipped again, so I ran over and sat on top of him. lol I don't remember how he ended up in this position, but his arms were outstretched, and my knees were on top of his arms so that he couldn't raise them. I just sat there until the security guard was able to get up and come get him. The other security guard showed up at this point and they actually handcuffed him and took him upstairs to await the police.

What they told me later, was that while they were waiting for the police, the shoplifter pulled a knife out of his pocket and laughed. Yikes! I never considered that he would have a weapon on him!

One other shoplifting adventure didn't go so well. I was standing behind the counter again. The counter was a sort of U shape, so that there was only one exit. It was quite a long counter, so you had to go all the way to the end to come out from behind it. As I was standing there, I saw two teenagers come walking quickly by me with a whole armful of albums. I couldn't get to them fast enough because of the stupid counter. I called security, but they couldn't catch the kids by that time. :(

4 comments:

Nene said...

Now see, all these years, Mom's been telling it that you did some kind of martial arts hold on his arm and he couldn't get up again.
The truth has "outed"!

Lindsay Logic said...

It's still a funny story! Thanks for setting the record straight, though. lol :)

Amber said...

such a cool story - I love that you were so brave! :)

Inklings said...

I never heard that story before, I had only heard Mom's version, the one where you used your martial arts skills to take down the shoplifter :0) See? It isn't just her age now that makes her get stories wrong, she's been doing it all the time. :0)