Hum the Tune to Deliverance While Reading

When I was a Sgt. in property crimes, we get a call from a neighboring PD saying that a moving van full of lumber had been stopped in their city. The officer noticed the van because it was so loaded down that when it hit a bump, sparks would fly out from under it. The driver and his passenger were really nervous so the officer began asking questions. To make a long story a little shorter, said officer had us call the local Homo Depot to see if they had sold such a large load to anyone that night.

After much checking, it was found that someone had picked up a "will-call." Now for all of you, like me, that have no idea what that is, I will attempt to explain. Seems like if you go into the store and buy a riding lawnmower but are driving a V.W. they will allow you to pay and send someone in a truck to pick it up later. They give you this paper that has an invoice number and reference numbers of the item(s) that were purchased. It does not list the item itself. A clerk takes the invoice number, punches it in the computer, and it tells them what bin the merchandise has been stored. They go to the bin and look for the item(s) with the same invoice number and load the item for the customer. The clerk that is loading has no way to know what the purchased item is by the will-call.

When they checked on the numbers referenced on the will-call, it pulled up a sale on a riding mower not a load of lumber. So my partner and I set off to take custody of the truck people and sent a tow truck for the moving van with its load. You might imagine that picking up the front of the moving van would not improve on the sparking situation. We followed the tow truck back to our town, about an hour away, with sparks raining down on our car. It looked very much like a 4th of July gone bad.

It was now about 2 AM and we should have gotten off at 11 PM. No one was very happy to still be awake. Homo Depot closed at 9 PM and their loss guy had driven over an hour to get to our store. Everyone wanted this to be a simple theft, lock them up, and go home. This was not to be!

I interviewed the driver and my partner interviewed the passenger. Come to find out we had an internal theft at Homo Depot. It turned out that one of their top managers who had worked for them for years and helped design their will-call system was a thief. He had been pulling the receipts of large sales that people took with them into will-calls for lumber. The people that we got were hired by him from time to time to drive over and pick stuff up. They told us the location of the warehouse to where they made their deliveries. We locked them up, made plans to meet the next day to try to recover their merchandise.

When I arrived the next day with warrant in hand, the loss guy was no where to be found. He made arrangements for a very overweight white guy and a muscular black guy to drive one of their trucks with me two counties over for the recovery. I got an extra radio to give to them so we could talk back and forth on “channel 2” (car to car channel that did not go through the repeater). So off we went, me in plain clothes in a marked unit and the two of them in the Homo Depot truck. Both were really nice guys and we had some friendly banter during the trip over the radio.

Once in the right county, we turned off the main 4 lane highway onto a narrow two lane road. The conversation went like this:

Them: You do know where we are going, don’t you?
Me: I have written directions.
Them: How will you know were to go? We haven’t seen a street sign or highway maker in a while.
Me: Look for a huge Oak tree with a broken down Jeep beside it. We turn there.
Them: Are you kidding?
Me: Not really.
About this time, we turn and start crossing a very narrow horseshoe shaped one lane wooden bridge over a gorge that had to be a good 90 feet deep.
Them: Will this bridge hold our weight?
Me: [giggling] I’m not sure, think one of you should get out and walk across after we get off of it?
Black guy: Do you see all those Confederate flags in everyone’s yards? No way I’m getting out.
Me: [start humming the tune to Deliverance over the radio]
White boy: That’s not funny! I’m a fat boy and I’m not getting out.

We drive on and the “houses” are shacks. Confederate flags are everywhere. Harleys are all over the place, not the $40,000 ones that are so popular now but the motorcycle gang type. People are coming out on their porches with shotguns and shit. The local Sheriff was supposed to send a unit to meet us when we turned off the highway but he was nowhere to be found.

White boy: Not so funny now, is it?
Me: I’m just a white woman with a gun, how much respect you think I am going to get?
Black guy: You do not leave my side, you hear me? You have a gun so you’re with me!

Finally, we made it to the warehouse which was an old car repair garage. The local deputy was waiting for us there. I served the warrant and the boys started loading up the truck. We recovered about $6000 worth of lumber so it took them a long time. It was in August which meant a temperature of about 98 with 95% humidity. The white guy got hot and sat down to drink some water and rest.

Me: Not to rush you or anything but my ass will be on the four lane before that sun sets.
Black guy: No ones going to catch my black ass here after dark so I’m going with her.
White guy jumping up: Ya’ll aren’t leaving me here to squeal like a pig!

I have never seen two guys move so fast. I even started loading lumber. We were on the four lane before dark!

Just an FYI: About two weeks later, I went to Homo Depot to get $60 worth of lumber donated to Girl Scouts for a picnic table. They wouldn’t donate even a nail! All the other lumber yards in the area not only donated enough wood to make 3 to 4 tables each, they donated all the hardware too! So I shop at Lowe's if I can’t find stuff at the locally owned places.