Too Close For Comfort
“The robberies of the wicked shall be their downfall,
Because they would not do judgment.”
Proverbs 21:7
One warm summer night while driving my taxi, I came upon the unfortunate instance of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I drove a cab for a few years without incident. It’s not like I was in NYC or Chicago and 99% of the time I worked the tourist areas. This one night I remember was particularly slow, so I hit the street calls on the dispatch computer. There’s usually enough to go around in the attractions, but that night was quiet.
I was working the Kissimmee area east of Disney, a big lower middle class region south of Orlando. As I was heading south on John Young Parkway, I took a flag down at a shopping center. He appeared normal at first glance. Jeans, blue and yellow windbreaker, and clean shaven. I was so used to families at Disney sometimes needing to use the front seat too that it didn’t occur to me to lock the front passenger door while I worked the streets. In hindsight of the situation that was about to occur, I’m glad he was up front.
He entered the cab and sat next to me. He asked me to bring him to Vine and Hoagland, which was about 4 miles away. I was about to ask him how his evening was going when he pulled a knife, pushing it against my right side, grabbing my collar and telling me to hand over my money. I tried to stay as calm as I could, and at first was reasoning with him, but he wasn’t having any of it. He yelled to me to “shut up” and had me turn right on Carroll Street a dark 3 mile long 2 lane road lined with cattle farms. In his eyes it was a perfect spot to rob me. At no time did I ever think I was going to die, but I was frightened. But I wasn’t scared enough to not try to keep him from hurting me. As we drove further down Carroll Street he told me to give him my wallet. The whole time he had his knife pressed into my side. I said “OK” and slowly retrieved my wallet. All my earnings were in my front right pocket, so I thought it was now or never. I decided to try and stop him.
His first mistake is when I went to hand him the wallet, he kept his left hand on my collar, but took the knife away from my side to grab my wallet. When he reached up, I slammed on the breaks hard and fast, throwing him into the dash board and windshield. He of course neglected to put on his seat belt when he got in, intending to rob me and make a quick getaway.
As the car slowed down we started fighting. We were grappling at each other, and all I cared about was avoiding getting stabbed. For a moment he got his right hand loose and swatted at my stomach with his knife. It wasn’t very sharp, but it did tear my shirt and scratch my stomach. I elbowed him hard in the face with my right arm, and at that moment he decided maybe he bit off more than he could chew. I mean, I was like twice his size. I give him credit for trying, but I wasn’t getting robbed that night. He opened the door while I was punching him with the back of my fist repeatedly. He quickly got out and ran fast west on Carroll into the night. For a split second I thought I could follow him while calling 911 but I decided to just stay there. I immediately called dispatch on the radio. They asked if I was hurt, I said not really, just shaken up. They sent the police and Fire rescue anyway, for a police report to be taken. It was standard procedure for the cab company, and even though this scumbag didn’t get my wallet or money, I did want to see him get caught. I had a lot of friends in the cab business, some I still keep in touch with even now, years later, and I’d hate to see this happen to them.
The cops put out a BOLO on this guy, and right before, they left the scene they told me another unit picked up a guy matching the description. I rode in the cruiser to their location to ID the guy, but it wasn’t him. They took me back to my cab and we wrapped it up. The fire department had left after they checked me out, but a cop stayed at the scene waiting for me to return from the attempted ID. Before I left, a K-9 unit showed up, caught the guys trail for about a half mile and then lost it.
I had my wallet, my cab, and my life. As I said, I never really feared for my life, but it did piss me off. I went home that night with my pride and my hard earned $80, still in my front pocket. I also had my .38 on an ankle holster, but I never had a chance to pull it. Looking back, it was a dumb place to carry while driving, and I was just too busy trying to fight him off. I can’t say for sure if I would’ve fired had I grabbed it, but considering his cowardly demeanor, I might not have needed to shoot him.
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