Longtown, Oklahoma



From the McAlester News-Capital of January 16, 2004

Combs gets his man



As Longtown resident Bruce Combs prepared to pull his pickup off Kiamichi Street onto State Highway 9, he noticed something unusual.



Combs had stopped to let a truck and trailer heading west on Highway 9 go by before he pulled on the road.



Watching the approaching vehicle through the early-morning darkness last Sunday, Combs started to wonder about the other driver.



"The driver had his lights off; I thought that was odd," Combs said. He also thought the trailer looked kind of familiar.



Then, as the truck and trailer by him passed by, Combs suddenly realized why the trailer seemed so familiar to him.



"He drove by and I thought 'Hey, that's my trailer!'" Combs said.



Combs recognized the trailer as the C&C Quality Building trailer he had left parked at his store, Longtown Texaco.



Already fed up after previous break-ins at the store, Combs swung his pickup behind the other driver. He tried to call 911, but wasn't sure if there was a link to Longtown so he wasn't surprised when that didn't work.



As the driver in front of him started to pick up speed, Combs threw the phone in his pickup seat, pulled into the passing lane and grabbed a pistol he carried with him.



"I pulled up next to him and yelled at him to pull over," Combs said. When the other driver ignored him, the determined Combs hit the gas pedal and quickly swerved his pickup in front of the other vehicle.



"He pulled off the highway" and into the parking lot of a nearby restaurant, Combs said.



With both vehicles stopped, Combs said he jumped out of his pickup and leveled his pistol at the other driver.



"I said 'Get out of your truck and keep your hands where I can see them,'" Combs recalled. He said he also ordered a woman who was with the driver out of the truck. He let a boy with them remain inside the vehicle, he said.



The other driver tried to negotiate, according to Combs.



"He said 'I'll take your trailer back,' and I said 'No, you won't,'" Combs recalled.



"I told him to keep his hands up. He had on a long black leather coat and he kept putting his hands down and I couldn't see his left hand, so I fired a shot into the ground" Combs said. "He quit doing it after that."



Combs called the Pittsburg County Sheriff's Department. He said Deputy Dave Grider, who was in the area, made it to the scene in a few minutes.



Grider arrested the other driver, identified as Everett Whittaker, 33, of Pryor, who has been charged with grand larceny and second-degree burglary.