From the vault: Roofman
The DOGLAND book tour continues apace. (“Apace” is one of those words that nobody ever says but it looks kind of cool on the page.)
Last night we had a blast at M. Judson in Greenville … tonight I’m with my friend Bronwen Dickey at Hub City Bookshop in Spartanburg … and Wednesday night I’m with my friend Ernie Suggs at the Wrecking Bar in Atlanta (sponsored by A Cappella Books).
But today I have a different story to share.
Yesterday morning I opened my Charlotte Ledger newsletter to find a piece by my old Charlotte Observer colleague Mark Washburn. It’s about an upcoming Channing Tatum movie based on the story of a serial robber who would break into a McDonald’s through the roof and politely rob the store. He came to be known as Roofman. His life eventually brought him to Charlotte. And the story got even better from there.
So I’m reading this story and Mark quotes a column I wrote about all of this back in 2005. And reader, I have to tell you: I didn’t remember writing it. I’ve written so many columns at this point that even some of the strange ones fall through the cracks of memory.
Mark was kind enough to forward me the original story from the Observer. So I thought I’d share it with y’all. I can’t wait to see this movie.
HER DREAM GUY TOYED WITH A LOT OF PEOPLE'S TRUST - IN TRUTH, HE WAS ROBBER ON RUN
January 8, 2005
He called himself John. He said he worked for the government. He dated a woman he met at church.
He gave board games to her kids. When the church collected gifts for the needy at Christmas, no one brought more toys than John.
Nobody thought to ask where the gifts came from. Nobody even got his last name.
"He came to Bible study on Wednesday nights," said his pastor, Ron Smith. "Very engaging. Down to earth. Nice fellow."
"Funny, romantic, the most sensitive man I've ever met," said the woman he dated, Leigh Wainscott. "The guy that every girl would want."
That was John.
The same man whose real name is Jeffrey Allen Manchester, convicted of robbery in Gaston County, on the run after escaping from prison in June.
He lived in a cubbyhole in the empty Circuit City building on East Independence Boulevard. Police say he furnished his hideout by stealing from the Toys "R" Us next door.
Wainscott says John gave her diamond earrings for Christmas. Police say Manchester robbed the Toys "R" Us the next morning.
You might understand that his pastor and his girlfriend are having a hard time squaring Jeffrey with John.
"I haven't had time to write my sermon for Sunday," Smith said Friday afternoon. "But I know I've got to deal with all this. Basically, I'm going to talk about how there's good and bad in all of us."
Smith's church is Crossroads Presbyterian on Monroe Road. Go out the back of the Circuit City building, walk a few hundred yards to Monroe and you're at the church. John showed up there in October.
He blended in from the start, bonding with the Bible-study group, volunteering through the church at Loaves & Fishes.
Wainscott had noticed him right away. She's 40 and separated after a 20-year marriage. At a church singles' lunch on Nov. 14, she and John got to talking. He asked her out, and she said yes.
"Intrigued is a good word. I was intrigued," she said. "He said he had a government job, but he couldn't tell anybody what he did. I asked about going to his place. He said it was a government building, a sterile environment."
(He had been living in a cell at the Brown Creek Correctional Institution in Anson County, four years into a 45-year sentence for robbery. Police say he escaped by hanging onto the underside of a truck.)
She and John went to movies and concerts, but lots of nights they just stayed at her apartment, playing games with her three kids or watching TV. She noticed that he treasured simple things, like looking out the window at the stars.
At church, he showed up for the Christmas party dressed up like the Easter bunny. He gave his pastor the first two seasons of "Seinfeld" on DVD.
He gave Wainscott the diamond earrings and some scarves. They talked about seeing the world.
The day after Christmas, police say, Manchester robbed the Toys "R" Us and took an off-duty deputy's gun.
That day, investigators found a secret door connecting the store to Circuit City, and found stolen toys stashed in the ceiling.
On Jan. 2, a police officer patrolling the vacant building found the hideaway - stocked with food, a DVD player, a bus-route map and a portable toilet.
Police found Manchester's fingerprint and announced that he'd been seen in the area. Somebody tipped police about his connection to the church.
On Wednesday, Wainscott's birthday, an officer came to see her at work. He showed her a picture.
"That's John," she said.
She arranged for him to come to her apartment. He showed up with flowers. Police arrested him before he got to talk to her.
Police Capt. Eddie Levins said Manchester had settled into a routine around town, working out at Peak Fitness in Matthews, eating at Red Lobster on Albemarle Road.
"If you draw a doughnut around that Circuit City, I bet he talked to everyone within a mile of there," Levins said.
Ron Smith saw a TV report Tuesday night about a prison escapee. He mentioned to his wife that it looked a lot like John. But it was an old picture, and so Smith went to work the next day and started doing research on the Internet. Before he got far the police knocked on his door.
"My B.S. meter is pretty good. It's pretty tough to scam me," Smith said. "There is a good side to this guy. That's what I'm struggling with now, the other side."
Now Ron remembers how much he and John loved to talk about movies. He remembers showing John his collection of old movie posters.
One of the posters is for "The Great Escape."
Smith hopes to visit Manchester at the jail. Wainscott talked to him the night he was arrested. He apologized over and over. She told him she didn't hate him.
"I can't say anything bad about him," she said. "I'm glad he didn't tell me about all the other things. We were making memories. That's what he'd always say. We were making memories."
—TT
This is exactly the kind of column I remember you wrote. Priceless 😎
What a story!