MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. -- The thief almost got away, until he found himself on the receiving end of a sprinting, six-foot-tall, 180-pound Marine.
“I don’t even think he saw what hit him,” said Dan Ruvo, a cell phone sales associate at the Marine Corps Exchange.
Ruvo was working at his cell phone booth when he witnessed a man hustle by with his arms full of purses and shoe boxes. Then Ruvo saw two MCX employees shouting for the man to stop.
“That was when I was like, ‘boom,’ over the stand and chasing the guy,” said an excited Ruvo.
The suspected thief noticed Ruvo, tossed the merchandise in his path, and ran into the parking lot.
“He threw all the boxes and stuff at me and then took off running,” said Ruvo, from Fallbrook, Calif. “I thought he was going to get away.”
But thieves don’t get away in broad daylight on a Marine Corps base.
“I was just standing in the parking lot with my friend when I heard somebody yell,” said Cpl. Chaz A. Prothro, machine gunner, Company C, 1st Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, and a witness to the event.
Prothro and his friend headed toward the ruckus and saw a man running away from MCX employees. Prothro’s friend reached the thief first, but couldn’t get good grasp on him. Prothro just lowered his shoulder and went in for the kill.
“It was a little bit of a fight, so I just hit him and drove my legs, until he was on the ground,” Prothro said. “Then when I looked up, I saw a wall of green coming toward us.”
That wall of green was a group of other Marines closing in to help subdue the alleged criminal. Prothro described the man as young, muscular and willing to fight.
“He uppercutted a gunny during the struggle,” Prothro said. “Then we really put the pressure on him.”
The military police with the Provost Martial’s Office arrived on the scene a few minutes later to apprehend the man.
Even around civilian shopping areas there’s a hero factor, there’s going to be people who are willing to step it up if something like that happens, Prothro said. On a Marine base, multiply that by 200-percent, he added.
The Marines offered the thief one bit of advice before turning him over to police. “You’re in the wrong place to be doing this type of stupid stuff,” Prothro said.