Monday, handcuffs were of service to some bonafide nogoodniks in Highland and Yucaipa.
Both cities contract with the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department for law enforcement service. Sheriff’s deputies routinely carry handcuffs.
It is understandable then, that at about 3:30 a.m., when an unidentified man was parked about a half-mile southeast of the Highland sheriff’s station, which serves as the Highland Police Department headquarters, he assumed a blond-haired white man in his late 20s wearing a green jacket similar to those worn by sheriff’s personnel was a deputy.
The man, described as 5-feet-10 and 150 pounds and wearing blue jeans identified himself as a police officer and ordered the man to get out of his car, which, which was near Norwood Street and Bonita Avenue.
“The victim was parked in the area…when the suspect approached his vehicle and identified himself as a police officer,” investigators said in a written statement. “The suspect had the victim get out of his vehicle and handcuffed him.”
After taking the victim’s wallet, the robber ran away.
In Yucaipa later that day, at around 3:41 p.m. 21-year-old Yucaipa resident Aaron Cole allegedly engaged in a theft at the Subway sandwich shop near the I-10 and Yucaipa Boulevard. The theft was reported and deputies responded, apprehending Cole a short distance away a little less than an hour later. Cole was handcuffed, but began, according to a sheriff’s department statement “to manipulate the handcuffs to get them off his wrists. The deputy tried to reposition the cuffs, but Cole had already freed one hand. The deputy was wrestling with Cole when Cole used the unattached handcuff as a weapon and struck the deputy in the face.”
Cole was able to run from the scene, but other deputies came up on him as he was trying to go back into the Subway restaurant.
Cole was arrested was arrested at 4:37 p.m. and booked for investigation of resisting arrest and assault likely to cause great bodily injury.