Robert Dever does not call himself a hero. "I'm not a hero, it's the men and women in uniform that are heroes," he says. Dever and another Greer resident, Timothy Cutter, were just talking outside their homes in the Hammett Farms subdivision Wednesday when they noticed something unusual. "I saw this guy just standing near the woods acting strange," remembers Dever. "And I said hey dude, stop!"
Hours earlier, Greer Police say the suspect, 21 year old Sean Allen Kirkpatrick, attempted to break into a townhome in the neighborhood. "He broke the back window, but never made it inside, because the alarm went off," says Lt. Jim Holcome with Greer Police. Officers showed up and a canine tried to track Kirkpatrick, but after hours of searching, they could not find him.
Forty five minutes later, as Dever and Cutter stood outside, they spotted Kirkpatrick and took off after him. "I ran around the front and found him crouched down in the grass," says Dever. "I told him to put his hands behind his head and not move." The neighbors held the suspect until police could arrive.
It's a first for Holcombe, who's never heard of residents going to that extreme. "Obviously, we're glad they were there, but we're really stressing people to stay safe," he says. "There's no telling what could have happened if this guy had a weapon."
Instead, police advise residents to try to avoid taking matters into their own hands. "The best thing you can do sometimes is be a good witness," says Holcombe. "Get a tag number, a direction of travel, and a good description of the suspect," he says.
Dever says adrenaline helped him, but if he had seen a weapon, he would have certainly backed off. "I'm not stupid," he says.
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