Longview man, 82, throws football block to take down suspected burglar

Police in Longview, Wash. have an 82-year-old man to thank for helping them nab a suspected burglar.

Terry Miracle, 82, says moves he learned on the Puyallup High School football field helped him take down a burglary suspect leading police on a chase through his neighborhood on Friday.

Miracle tells KIRO Radio’s Luke Burbank he used a cross-body block to take down the suspect in his backyard.

“He came around the corner, and I had a tiny fraction of a second to see him, the direction he was going, and where I was, and I said to myself, ‘Cross-body block, I can do it. I can get him.’ And I ran and did it and did get him.”

Miracle says he learned the move when he was playing second-string center at Puyallup High School.

“My responsibility on kickoffs, when the other team was kicking to us, my responsibility was to knock down the kicker so that he would not play anymore role,” says Miracle.

“I saw him [the burglary suspect] coming at me the same way I saw the kickoff man coming at me on a kickoff, and he was going so that we could meet at a point where I could perfectly throw this block.”

The block took down the suspect, and Miracle says police, who were only about 20 yards behind the suspect, were able to contain him.

Though the hit was hard enough to take down the suspect, Miracle says he wasn’t hurt.

“I had my knee pads from when I was down in the garden.”

Miracle says he wasn’t trying to be a hero. His old football moves just kicked in like instinct.