Footprints In Snow Lead Police To Suspect

By Craig Day, The News On 6

TULSA, OK -- The ice and snow helped Tulsa Police find an armed robbery suspect Wednesday night.

Officers were called out to a Mazzio's Pizza restaurant at 15th and Sheridan. A delivery driver told them he had been robbed by a man at 1300 S. 73rd East Ave.

The man said he had a gun, demanded pizza and a cell phone. He got them and walked away.

When police and the delivery man got to the location of the robbery, they saw a set of footprints, Officer Leland Ashley said.

Officers followed those footprints made in several inches of snow and ice. Step by step it led them to the robber's door not even a half a block away.

"Just so happens that as the officers were walking up to the door, the suspect steps out," Ashley said.

The man was still wearing the same shoes that matched the tread pattern left in the snow. The victim identified him as the robber.

Officers arrested 19-year-old Jhirimi McClendon on a complaint of robbery with a dangerous weapon. He was booked in the Tulsa Jail early Thursday with bond set at $50,000.

"Maybe luck is a little better than good sometimes, and this time we were real lucky this individual chose to commit this robbery and walk in the snow," Ashley said.