It was Thursday night. I hustled down the escalator at Gallery Place - Chinatown, the Metro stop I take to get home from the law school. My journal meeting had gone just past nine o'clock, and I was trying to catch a train that would get me to the Pentagon bus terminal in time to catch the ART 87 bus, which would get me home in time for my
book club chat.
Drat, the next yellow line train wouldn't be there until 9:25. I pulled out my iPhone 4G, my big Christmas present from my family, to text Cindy that I would be a few minutes late to our chat. I then began to read my email, which can accumulate to unmanageable levels if I don't stay on top of things. Ooh, an email from
Chris about his visit! I started to type out a response, and before I knew it, my train had arrived.
I boarded the train, still typing, and sat down by the door since there were two seats available--one for me, one for my gigantic backpack, weighed down with my laptop, two textbooks, the Bluebook, and various other things that I need to function as a law student. The intercom ding-dinged, and a familiar, polite, female voice told me for the thousandth time, "Step back, doors closing." I settled in for the 12-minute train ride and kept typing. The train conductor announced the next station, "Archives - Navy Memorial." That's when it happened.
Just as the train doors opened at the station, a man ran up from behind me and snatched my phone right out of my hands and sprinted out the door. I shouted, "HEY!" but before I had time to even think about how to react to the theft, another man from the train bolted after the thief, in an apparent attempt to apprehend him and save my phone. I grabbed my backpack and ran out of the train after the two of them, but they were both unencumbered by backpacks, and made it up the first escalator much more quickly than I. I reached the top of the escalator just in time to see the thief leap over the ticket barrier to the Metro station and continue running toward the second escalator to the street level. Without hesitation, my would-be hero followed suit, vaulting over the barrier with ease. I fumbled for my SmarTrip card and quickly paid for my short train ride, hurrying up the second escalator after the two of them.
It was at that point that I noticed a third guy had gotten involved with the chase. The station had three escalators, two going up, and he ran up the escalator next to mine and beat me to the street level. By the time I reached the street, the scene unfolding was intense. It seemed that the thief had outrun my hero, who was instead confronting the third guy, who turned out to be the thief's buddy. My hero had pulled out his phone to take a photo of the third guy, who started shouting and maybe pushed him away. I stood a few steps back, unsure what to do, when a fourth guy got involved, pulling a gun.
I reeled back, saying, "Whoa, whoa!" in a hushed attempt to diffuse the situation. The man with the gun then pulled out his badge, revealing himself to be an off-duty DC Police officer. His wife and four-year-old daughter stood near the entrance to the Metro, petrified. The officer took control of the situation, separating my hero from the accomplice, until the Metro Transit Police arrived a few minutes later.
I thanked my hero, who, incredibly, was berating his failure to catch the thief. "I'm so sorry," he kept repeating, "I'm a distance runner, not a sprinter." We chatted for a while as the police interrogated the accomplice, waiting for an officer to take our statements. I learned that my hero was an FBI agent who had moved to DC about four months ago. I thanked him profusely for his attempt to apprehend the thief, and we discussed how no one else on the train, on the platform, or on the escalators had gotten involved with the chase. There were dozens of people who might have intervened, but only my hero had overcome the instinct for self-preservation and taken action. I marveled at his boldness.
We gave our statements, and I received some information about how to get the police report in five working days. The officers chatted with us, and it turned out that one of them was from Livermore, California. When I told him I was from Sunnyvale, he not only knew the city, but recollected that there was a good Chinese restaurant in downtown, but he had forgotten the name. "Tao Tao?" I offered. "Yes, that's it!" he replied excitedly. We all laughed at the coincidence of having met in DC, so far from the Bay Area.
The police gave my hero and I free entry to the Metro--apparently being robbed or trying to run down a thief merits a free ride. We boarded the yellow line train, and chatted. I got off at Pentagon City, over an hour later than I had anticipated, and took a cab home, the last ART 87 bus of the night having departed long ago, and the next 10A bus not arriving for ages. I mused about all of the things that could have gone differently to avoid the situation: I could have borrowed Jess' car to get to school (she was out of town), my journal meeting could have gotten out sooner, I could have jaywalked at 5th St. NW, I could have stood on the escalator instead of walking down it, I could have walked to a different part of the train platform... So many events had to coalesce just so to result in the theft, and yet, there we all were.
Moral of the story: don't have your smartphone out when you sit close to the door late at night. The Metro has been
warning us about this common crime for a while. I am usually very aware of my surroundings and put my phone away if I think there's a risk, but I didn't detect an unsafe situation when I boarded the train that night.
