Young boys attempt armed carjacking of Portland woman
Dec 10, 2012, 11:58 AM | Updated: 12:46 pm
It’s scary and surreal enough when someone tries to carjack you. But when the armed robber is an 11-year-old boy, it’s a real jaw dropper.
That’s what happened Saturday to 22-year-old Amy Garrett of Portland, OR. She tells local station KPTV she was terrified when the boy, flanked by his 7-year-old friend, pointed the gun at her demanding she turn over her truck along with her purse and her phone.
“He was like showing me his gun and I asked him if it was real and he was like ‘you don’t ever ask anybody if it’s real. That’s how you get yourself shot,” Garrett tells KPTV.
Garrett says the older boy threatened to “blow her brains out” if she didn’t turn over her truck and her stuff as she sat in the parking lot of the Freedom Foursquare church waiting for her parents.
Instead, she quickly drove off. As she sped away, she saw the boy pull out the gun and feared he would open fire.
“My heart was like beating a million miles an hour. I’m surprised it didn’t completely beat out of my chest,” Garrett says.
Garrett called 911 and the cops quickly caught the boys. Police found a loaded and cocked .22 caliber handgun in the 11-year-old’s pocket.
But because they’re both under 12, they couldn’t be sent to a juvenile detention center and were turned over to their parents instead.
The 11-year-old actually showed up back at the church the next day as a TV news crew was interviewing Garrett.
“It makes me really upset that they can’t do anything about the kids,” Garrett says. “I think that, no matter what the age, they’re dangerous.”
The case has reportedly been handed off to a Juvenile Court, as detectives continue to investigate how the the boy got hold of the weapon.