Posted on 07/02/2012 8:33:15 AM PDT by marktwain
Dennis Terry decided to take a different route to the post office Thursday morning, and it’s a good thing he did.
While driving on College Avenue near downtown Athens, he saw a man and woman struggling over a bag. When Terry stopped and backed up to see what was going on, he saw the man punch the woman, knocking her to the ground as she still clung to the bag.
“I had the windows up but I could hear the first lick he hit her with because it was so hard,” Terry said.
Terry didn’t think twice about what to do next.
The 61-year-old Athens man grabbed his pistol and jumped out of his truck.
“I went running toward them and started hollering. ‘You get down and turn her loose or I’ll shoot,’” Terry said in an interview Friday with the Athens Banner-Herald.
“I got within about 15 feet of them and told him to ‘get down or I’ll shoot’ two or three times, and when he saw I meant business he turned her loose and ran,” Terry said.
Terry, who used to own a construction company and is now a semi-retired consultant, said he only learned later from the police that the man had a gun he stole from the victim’s SUV.
“Things could have turned out in a bad way, but I will tell you this, if he had come at me with that gun I would have shot him,” Terry said.
The man who Terry confronted is 57-year-old Samuel Tyrone Evans, a career criminal who served nine terms in state prisons, beginning in 1972. He most recently got out of jail on June 12 for a drug-related arrest.
About 9:30 a.m. Thursday, Evans broke a window of the 26-year-old Comer woman’s SUV while it was in a parking lot on College Avenue between Ware Street and Cleveland Avenue.
The woman returned to her vehicle as Evans rummaged through it, and that’s when the fight began, Athens-Clarke police said.
After Terry intervened, Evans led police officers, sheriff’s deputies and other authorities on a manhunt through heavily wooded areas along railroad tracks in and near the downtown area. Evans was arrested more than five hours after the attack as Georgia State Patrol troopers saw him in the area of Willow Street and North Avenue. Evans ran into some woods when the troopers tried to speak with him, and after officers set up a perimeter around the area, they eventually found and arrested him.
Evans was charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, entering auto, battery and obstruction of a law enforcement officer.
His victim was treated at Athens Regional Medical Center for several injuries, mostly bruises and scrapes, according to police.
Terry makes daily trips to the post office, normally driving from his business on Newton Bridge Road and remaining on it until it becomes Barber Street and dead-ends on Prince Avenue.
For some reason, on Thursday morning he decided to make a left onto Cleveland Avenue, then take College Avenue to get downtown, leading him past the scene of the violent struggle.
“I think this was a case of God putting people in someone else’s life,” Terry said. “When I saw what that man was doing to that lady I was really concerned for her, and I don’t think I did anything that anyone else would have done under the same circumstances.
“I don’t know what would have happened if I hadn’t stopped because that man meant to hurt her; he meant to hurt her bad.” he said.
• Follow Criminal Justice reporter Joe Johnson at www.facebook.com/JoeJohnsonABH or www.twitter.com/JoeJohnsonABH.
God bless this man. Ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Thank God he was armed and wasn’t hurt.
“The man who Terry confronted is 57-year-old Samuel Tyrone Evans, a career criminal who served nine terms in state prisons, beginning in 1972”
Whatever happened to the “three strikes” thing?
I know everything I need to know by the middle name, Tyrone.
“...57-year-old Samuel Tyrone Evans, a career criminal...”
_______________________________________________
Is this one of Holder’s people?
His name is a clue to his ethnicity........
Yep...just saw his pic; he’s one of Holder’s people.
That's California.
Career criminals like Tyrone need to be taken out of society permanently. They commit LOTS of crimes per week. Ever consider how many muggings, robberies, and burglaries one would have to do each month to keep oneself fed, housed, and drugged/liquored up? Taking a career criminal off the streets reduces the neighborhood crime rate a LOT.
I only ever knew one person named Tyrone. Last I heard of him he was in jail for rape.
This perp was just one of many people in prison for a non-violent drug related offense..the kind they want to let loose.
Yep. I read somewhere that the average career criminal does $250,000 worth of damage per year. And that doesn't even count the emotional damage to the victims.
So it would be a lot cheaper to lock them up permanently. And cheaper still to make them work. I say bring back the prison farms and the roadside chain gangs.
Yep. Busting a car window to grab a purse might net the thief less than a hundred, while fixing the window might cause hundreds. Injuries from a mugging may involve thousands in hospital bills. Stolen items from a house will be lucky to be fenced for a few percent of their replacement costs. It's cheaper to have them locked up.
I'd like a variation of the "three strikes" law, where after conviction the jury is handed the guy's ENTIRE criminal record, and gets to vote on whether to execute him.
If I had my way, we'd bring back the exile option too. Put them in a cold place like the Aleutians; minimum security would be needed; relatives could go visit or even move there with them, for a small fee or two...
Just like car-jacking, which Concealed Carry virtually ended, if enough of these type situations keep coming up the thugs will decide to find easier targets, in their own holder’s people hood.
Society: a highly structured system of human organization for large-scale community living that normally furnishes protection, continuity, security, and a national identity for its members: American society.
So...if a person has shown, through consistent and multiple actions, that said person does not want to abide by societies rules, why are we using these rules when dealing with them?
I say feudal/tribal law should be applied. Banishment from our borders with a death penalty if they return.
I think Canada could be talked into renting out Ellesmere Island or the Queen Elizabeth islands.
It appears Samuel Tyrone is a slow learner.
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