Detective Joe Murray’s “Make My Day” Moment With Cabbie Carjackers
All it takes is a friendly, informative Twitter account to humanize a person or an institution. Philadelphia Detective Joe Murray’s Twitter feed is great—funny, playful, but also deadly serious when it comes to crime—and it’s helped convince me that not every cop in this city is waiting to punch a civilian when the cameras stop running.
Still, it was kind of thrilling to run across the latest Tweet from the detective on Monday night:
Congrats cabbie carjackers. You’ve got our attention. Now enjoy your last few days as free men.
— Joseph Murray (@PPDJoeMurray) February 19, 2013
And suddenly it made police work in this town seem a lot more … exciting. Yeah, you go Joe Murray! Kick some carjacker BUTT! Woooo!
My reaction was apparently normal:
@ppdjoemurray WOW! STRONG! POWERFUL! DO WELL! STAY SAFE! BTW, is that your email address with my birth date “boxed” at the end? ;-)
— DOROTHY BAILEY (@dorothe500) February 19, 2013
@ppdjoemurray Get em’ Joe, those horrible boys, Please lock them up for good! I Pray you get them fast! And no plea deals Judge!
— Cathy (@___Cathy___) February 19, 2013
But, uh, hey, what cabbie carjackers? ABC 6 reports:
Police are searching for two men linked to a violent hold-up, during which a cabbie was beaten, robbed, and then stuffed into a trunk.
It was around 11:15 p.m. last Thursday at the 69th Street Terminal when police say video shows two male suspects approaching a 54-year-old driver for County Cab and asking to be taken to 82nd Street and Lindbergh Avenue, and then to a housing project a couple blocks up the road at 82nd and Lyons.
The driver has 100 staples in his head, and remains hospitalized in “critical but stable” condition. And yeah, here’s rooting for Joe Murray and Philly Police to get the jerks who did it. Never having met the detective, the operating assumption from here on in is that he looks and sounds like Clint Eastwood.
