And...then...he...took...a...header...into...the...slough.

I had just walked back into the store after having gotten some dinner and straight ahead of me was a guy loading his jacket pockets up with candy, apparently oblivious to me looking directly at him. I took advantage of his obliviousness and found a place less conspicuous than the middle of the aisle to watch him.

Pretty soon, after filling his pockets, he wandered out of the aisle and out the doors. I followed him out and once he was in the parking lot I approached him and gave him my schpeal. He was cooperative and turned around to head back inside with me.

I knew it had to be too good to be true because just as we got to the doors he made a run for it. I was immediately on top of him and took him down, but I landed funny (thank you Mr. Murphy), which gave the guy space to scramble to his feet. I followed him up and grabbed a hold of his backpack (which kept me from simply jumping on his back and grabbing him around the neck in the first place). I got a good hold and I began to put the brakes on, but the guy was young and stronger than he looked, and he dragged me back into the parking lot. I then jumped onto his back, despite the backpack, and promptly slid off to the side which allowed him to turn to face me. This is generally not a good position to be in, especially considering that I was not very familiar with fighting from the clinch at this point in time.

I began to yell as loudly as I could, "Store security! Stop resisting arrest! Get on the ground NOW!"

He didn't respond to this like I would have liked and instead began to try to pull away. When he figured out that I wasn't going to let go of him he began to grab at my arms and said, "let go of me! I don't want to fight but I will!" to which I responded, "If you want to turn stealing candy into a Felony Robbery you're more than welcome to try to fight me".

Now he really struggled to get away and tried everything but hitting me to do so, including attempting to press a couple of my pressure points. Although he got them, under the effects of my adrenaline I shrugged it off and began to try to take him down with different sweeps and throws. With his knowledge of pressure points I figured he had practiced, or at least read up on, martial arts but now I was beginning to suspect that he had been a high school wrestler because this guy had a hell of a base and would not go down.

Although using pressure points now made this a robbery, I didn't feel particularly threatened by him so I didn't fight back in self defense, but he was really beginning to annoy me, so I found my OC and gave him a good spray in the face.

Now I know why they tell you in training to spray from a few feet out and move. Because I was so close to him the only thing it seemed to do was cover his face and make his eyes clamp shut. I hadn't sprayed it from far enough back to let it mist and be inhaled by him for full effect. Oh... and I got a dose of back spray (what's that they say about hindsight being 20/20?).

When the OC didn't have it's intended effect I decided to at least get us out of the middle of parking lot traffic and gave him a running shove about 15 or 20 feet backwards, hoping that he would at least trip or stumble and go down that way. No such luck.

I ended up running him into the side of a parked van and pinning him there in the hope of getting some leverage that I could use against him. Again, no such luck.

He now pushed back, and we ended up jockeying for position the entire length of the side parking lot, across the street behind the store, and were stopped by the cyclone fencing running the length of a slough.

Here he said, "man, I'm homeless. I can't go to jail!" and...then...he...took...a...header...into... the...slough. I could hardly F 'n believe it!

The drop was about 15 feet and although he caught a hold of the fence before he dropped all the way down, it was still a long way to fall.

Once he was down there the first thing he did was try to rinse his face off. Um, for future reference, that's not the way to wash off OC. He was going to regret that. I learned that lesson the hard way myself later that night when I got into the shower and was reminded that I had gotten back spray.

He then began to run downstream . I called the police and followed as best as I could on street level. He ended up (somehow) getting away. He is one of only three suspects in the last five years that have done so once I have laid hands on them.