Bad Bad Leroy

Well, this didn't turn out so well for anyone.

Dateline: Leroy, Alabama, where Nathaniel Johnson was rightly tired of people breaking into his mobile home.  So he set a trap. He parked his car over by a neighbor's house and hung around in the dark, waiting.

Around midnight, he heard someone knocking on the door of his trailer.  Of course, the person got no answer and then proceeded around to the back door, which he entered by breaking in.

Washington County Sheriff Richard Stringer says Johnson met Cleveland Jones Gully, 31, the suspected burglar, at the door and chased him outside.

The sheriff said Gully is known in the area for breaking into houses, and that he either fell or jumped off the back steps of the mobile home.

Yes.  Let's say he "fell."  

Johnson picked Gully up long enough to wrap his mouth up in duct tape.  Then he led Gully to a tree and placed him there for safe keeping while he went to call 911. To make sure he would be there when the law arrived, Stringer said Johnson wrapped Gully to the tree with insulated electrical tape and clothesline.

Johnson then to his neighbor's house and called police.

"(Gully) was still alive at that point, and there was no indication that he was dying," Stringer said.

Crime Scene, Leroy AL

But ten minutes later, sheriff's deputies rolled up on the scene and Gully was no longer among the living. The sheriff said Gully didn't have any visible injuries, just some cuts around his body from the wire. There will be an autopsy to find out what happened.  

The police say that other neighbors said that Johnson, who was not armed, did not intend for Gully to die, but he did want to bring the break-ins to an end.

I imagine this will go a long way in that regard.  The sheriff, meanwhile, will present the case to a grand jury "to see what they say about it."

I'm no expert on Alabama law, but I imagine the concept of "tough noogies" is also in effect down there.