This little story from Tulsa, Oklahoma is quite awesome. Some creep in a Batman mask tried to rob a local grocery story. Luckily for the store, the law, and YouTube watchers everywhere, American Airlines Mechanic Craig Stutzman was there to enact his own brand of vigilante justice:
The 44-year-old American Airlines mechanic brawled with an armed man at a Food Pyramid store Thursday, thwarting a robbery, possibly saving lives and putting on a show for the store's surveillance cameras that looked like a pay-per-view mixed martial arts bout.
"I guess you never know how you'll react in a situation like that until it happens, but I just went for it,” Stutzman said.
The fight left Stutzman with a swollen jaw and a dozen stitches on his forehead. Police arrived shortly after Stutzman subdued the gun-wielding man, identified by Tulsa police as Tony Leroy Cleveland, 38.
According to the Tulsa World, the robber tried to shoot his gun at a customer, the gun jammed, and Stutzman went all Paul Kersey on the jerk. Good for him:
One thing that stuck out about this video was how Stutzman's heroics are contrasted by the other customers' "nancy boy"-ness. Now I'm not saying flat out that I would leap at an armed robber and try to take him down... Stutzman's right, nobody can say that until they are in the situation. But I do think I can safely say that if somebody else were in a duel to the death with some maniac I'd jump in and lend the good guy a hand rather, than just sit back and let him do all the heavy lifting.
Yet only two guys in the store initially get anywhere near this brawl, and it takes them forever until they actually do anything. One guy jaws away on the phone and keeps his distance, and another guy keeps running up like he's going to do something before leaping back out of the way anytime the perp makes a move - leaving Stutzman to battle it out basically by himself for an agonizing amount of time. Finally, once the bad guy must be nearing exhaustion, phone man gets a few kicks in and the other customers help the real hero hold the robber down... just in time for them to look like studs as the police roll up.
Well, sorry guys... surveillance cameras caught the whole thing, so now your nancy-ness is on full display, in glorious Techniclor, for the entire world to see.
If this video were recast with the Xoom Team, I'd have to say that I, Mr. Xoom, would obviously be the heroic Stutzman, MacReady would be the one on the phone, calling for help instead of dishing it out himself, and Cleveland would be the little Lord Fauntleroy who jaunts in every time it looks like victory is at hand, only to spring away to a safe distance when baddie twitches a finger or utters some harsh language.
And, oh yeah, I almost forgot - Cutman would obviously be the perp we were all beating the hell out of on camera.
Catharsis, man. Catharsis.
Hat tip: Powerline.
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