the Razor Sharp Intelligence: Volume II

72 Year Old Man Pummels Pickpocket Suspect:
from Alternative Press
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Bill Barnes says he was scratching off a losing $2 lottery ticket inside a gas station when he felt a hand slip into his front-left pants pocket, where he had $300 in cash.

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He immediately grabbed the person's wrist with his left hand and started throwing punches with his right, landing six or seven blows before a store manager intervened.

"I guess he thought I was an easy mark," Barnes, 72, told The Grand Rapids Press for a story Tuesday.

He's anything but an easy mark: Barnes served in the Marines, was an accomplished Golden Gloves boxer and retired after 20 years as an iron worker. Jesse Daniel Rae, 27, was arraigned Monday in Rockford District Court on one count of unarmed robbery.

Barnes said he had just withdrawn the money from a bank machine and put it in the pocket of his shorts before driving to a service station in Comstock Park, a Grand Rapids suburb.

He remembers noticing a patron acting suspiciously, asking the price of different brands of cigarettes and other items. While turned away, Barnes felt the hand in his pocket, so he took action.

"I guess I acted on instinct," he said.

"There was blood everywhere," said another manager on duty, Abby Ostrom, 25.

Barnes was a regional runner-up in Golden Gloves competition in the novice and open divisions before enlisting in the Marines in 1956.

After retiring as an iron worker, he now works part-time as a starter at a golf course.

"I wouldn't want my wife to give me hell for lettin' that guy get my money," he said with a smile.