The Shell convenience store on Edgar Brown Drive at Bluebonnet was robbed by a man carrying a rifle at 1:14 a.m. Saturday. Orange police later arrested a man driving a car described as being at the robbery.
Orange Detective Captain Cliff Hargrave said the man, Dylan Michael Gray, was arrested for misdemeanor possession of synthetic marijuana. Captain Hargrave said the driver of a tanker truck delivering gasoline to the store saw the robber and another man who was the get-away driver.
When patrol officers stopped the car described by the witness, one man was inside and he was not wearing clothes matching the description of the robber. Police towed the 2006 Toyota four-door car to search. Detectives are continuing to investigate the robbery.
Orange patrol officers dealt with a variety of incidents during the weekend including a man who thought he was being eaten by a giant snake, a broken car window caused by a tossed pumpkin, and charred mail from an artillery-style firework set off at a residential mailbox. Police also reported that a man accuses his neighbor of stealing his water with a garden hose.
Officer Patrick McDonald answered a 911 call from a man who believed he was being eaten by giant snakes and had doused himself in ammonia. Officer McDonald went to the Northway Shopping center about 6:30 Friday evening and met the man, who was carrying a spray bottle with a chemical. The man “appeared to be out of touch with reality,” Officer McDonald wrote.
The man also told police giant anacondas were eating people and that everyone was dead and living inside a giant anaconda.
Police took the man to St. Elizabeth Hospital in Beaumont for treatment as a mental patient.
Then on Saturday morning, two unusual calls were reported concerning vandalism. One came at 9:40 a.m. from the International Apartments. A resident noticed his neighbor’s car had a cracked windshield. Officer Brian Latiolais reported a pumpkin was on top of the car.
A resident on Sandalwood Drive discovered about 8:30 a.m. that mail inside a mailbox had been burned. Officer Latiolais said he found a burned artillery shell-style firework under the mail box. The resident told the officer she had seen on a neighborhood Facebook page that kids had been egging cars. She heard a noise outside at midnight and went outside to check her car. She found the mailbox damage in the morning.
A man living on Bowling Lane called police about 7:30 Friday morning to report his neighbor. The man said the neighbor had been hooking up a garden hose to his outside spigot and taking water from one house to the other. The first time, the owner of the spigot unscrewed the water hose. The second time, he cut the hose. The third time, the man called police.
In the same neighborhood, a couple living in the 3700 block of Hemlock Street discovered at 4:50 a.m. Saturday that someone had broken a front window and torn the screen. Nothing was reported missing from inside the house.
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