Getaway Car Drags Officer, Nearly Strikes Customers After Shoplifting Incident at Stop & Shop: Middletown Police

MIDDLETOWN, CT — A Middletown man and woman failed to make a clean getaway after a soap theft at Stop & Shop in which an officer was dragged by the getaway car, which also nearly struck several customers on its way out of the parking lot, according to police.

Angelica Lebby, 28, and Willie Earl Perry, 51, were apprehended a short time later due to heavy traffic on Route 9, police said.

It all started when an officer, who was at Stop & Shop (located at 416 East Main Street) at about 11 a.m. on Oct. 20 following up another case, was alerted by a loss prevention officer that a woman was putting Dove soap into a purple Halloween bag.

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The officer then observed the suspect walk past all of the registers and head out the door, according to the police report.

The officer was only steps behind the woman and yelled out “Police! Stop!” multiple times but she began running toward a waiting red Pontiac Sunfire that was parked in the fire lane, according to the report.

Despite repeated orders from the officer to stop, the woman, later identified as Lebby, opened the passenger door and jumped into the car and closed the door, police said.

The officer then grabbed the door frame, as the passenger window was fully open, and ordered the driver to stop.

“He looked at me and pressed down hard on the gas pedal and began to drag me with the vehicle,” the officer wrote in the police report. “The female was looking directly at me as I yelled this. I let go of the vehicle after several steps and began to run after the vehicle, ordering the driver to stop. The driver’s window was also fully open and he was looking at me in the driver’s side view mirror and I was still ordering him to stop. He did not.”

The officer identified the driver as Perry based on “numerous encounters” in the past, according to the report.

The vehicle then sped through the parking lot and almost struck at least five customers, who were forced to jump out of the way, police said.

The vehicle fled out of the parking lot and turned southbound onto Saybrook Road, where it cut off another vehicle and almost struck it, according to police.

Multiple officers located the suspect vehicle traveling northbound on Route 9, then turning southbound, and were able to “take both suspects into custody due to heavy traffic without further incident,” police wrote in the report.

Police said the vehicle was not registered nor insured and the plates had expired years ago.

The stolen merchandise totaled $61.37 and was returned to Stop & Shop, according to police.

Perry, of Julia Terrace, was arrested on charges of assault on a police officer, interfering with an officer, first-degree reckless endangerment, reckless driving, misuse of plate, operating an unregistered motor vehicle and operating a motor vehicle without insurance.

Perry is being held on a $10,000 bond and is scheduled to appear in court on Nov. 4, according to state judicial records.

Lebby, of Hillside Avenue, was arrested on charges of third-degree robbery, interfering with an officer and sixth-degree larceny. She was released on a $25,000 surety bond and is due back in court on Nov. 15, according to state judicial records.

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