When a New York City sanitation worker unknowingly walked into the middle of a robbery at a 7-Eleven in Manhattan, he quietly sneaked behind the assailant and overpowered him in a heroic move captured on video, the store and police say.
Curtis Jackson, the 44-year-old probationary sanitation worker from Brooklyn, went into the store at 23rd Street and Park Avenue in Flatiron to use the restroom when he noticed a man holding onto something in his jacket pocket that looked like a firearm and that the cashier had his hands in the air, according to Tom Zigo, a spokesman for the Uniformed Sanitation Men's Association.
Jackson sneaked down one of the aisles behind the robber and lunged for the robber's arm to grab at the weapon, and pushed him against the wall, Zigo said. The robber turned out to be holding a hypodermic needle to mimic a gun, police said.
Jackson's partner called 911, and while officers were responding, the robber struggled with Jackson, Zigo said. Jackson wrestled the suspect to the ground until cops arrived.
Cellphone video of the confrontation shows Jackson, in his reflective sanitation vest, sitting on top of the robber as he shouted, "Don't move!"
As the man insists, "I didn't do anything," Jackson says: "Yes, you did. You tried to stick up the store. Like in the movies."
When the man says, "Please let me go," Jackson curtly responds: "No."
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Police said the suspect was taken to the 13th Precinct stationhouse and was expected to be arraigned.
