Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, September 29, 1994                   TAG: 9409290061
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: SCRUGGS                                 LENGTH: Medium

HE TOOK A BITE OUT OF CRIME

When Chuck Myers' peers made him their Neighborhood Watch captain two years ago, they made the right choice.

Myers, a retired Los Angeles police detective, was honored Tuesday by the Franklin County Neighborhood Watch Organization for his help in the capture of three teen-age burglars in October.

Myers and his wife, Wanda, a Roanoke native, moved to Smith Mountain Lake after he retired in 1984. The lake and the mountains provided Chuck Myers an opportunity to do two of his favorite things: fish and hunt.

The Myers live in the recently developed Winding Waters subdivision, a world away from the streets of Los Angeles.

Myers saw a lot on those streets in his 26 years with the Los Angeles Police Department. Rocks were thrown at him during the Watts riots in 1965, and he listened as a fellow narcotics officer was gunned down in a hotel room during a sting operation gone bad.

So, when two teen-agers started knocking on the door of Myers' Winding Waters home on an October day last year, they had no idea whom they were about to face.

Myers was in the basement of his house when he heard the knock on the door. He said the knock sounded more like the teens were trying to shake it open.

"They didn't think anyone was home," Myers said.

They were wrong.

Myers opened the door and immediately noticed that the bottoms of the teens' pants legs were soaking wet.

"I knew at that point that they had been in the woods behind my house. That's the only way their pants legs could have been that wet."

Myers then began to question his unannounced guests. One told Myers he was trying to find the home of a relative. Myers - who knows the owners of all the homes in the subdivision - asked the relative's name.

"I'd never heard the name before in my life," he said. "And they also said the relative lived near Hale's Ford Bridge. Anyone who lives around here knows that's about 10 miles from Winding Waters. Their stories just weren't consistent."

Fidgety and nervous, the teen-agers started on their way. Myers followed on foot. The teen-agers took off running and got into a waiting car.

Myers took off running, too, back to his house to get his truck. He drove after the car until he was close enough to get the license plate number.

Myers called the Franklin County Sheriff's Office and gave the dispatcher a description of the teen-agers, the car they were in and the tag number.

Later that night, the car was stopped by Roanoke police. Many items the juveniles had stolen from two lake homes were recovered.

Two of the burglars were sentenced to jail time.

Myers says the incident shows the effectiveness of the Neighborhood Watch program.

"It works because it makes people aware," he said.

Capt. Bob Strickler of the Franklin County Sheriff's Office started the program in 1982 and has watched it grow to cover about 90 percent of the county's homes. He says people like Myers make it a success.

"We can't do it alone," Strickler said. "Our Neighborhood Watch members serve as extra eyes and ears."

Myers was honored at the 11th annual Franklin County Neighborhood Watch picnic Tuesday night at the county's Recreation Park in Sontag.

This year, a caterer trucked in 600 pieces of fried chicken, and the Just Country band provided the tunes, including a foot-stomping rendition of "Rocky Top."

The event drew nearly 200 people, the largest crowd since the picnic was organized, Strickler said.

Myers could not make it to the picnic, so the president of the Winding Waters Property Owners Association, John Cocuzza, and the association's vice president, Dick Rang, accepted the award for their neighbor.

"We think a lot of Chuck," Cocuzza said. "He seems to always have the answers we need." Myers is the second person to be honored as part of the annual picnic.

Last year, Neighborhood Watch member Byron Amos was recognized for his crime-fighting contributions. He gave the Sheriff's Office the tag number of a car involved in suspicious activity that Amos witnessed while mowing his lawn.

The tip Amos provided resulted in multiple arrests in several jurisdictions, Strickler said.