2 more bounty hunters charged in Reading, PA
READING, Pa. (AP) -- A pair of bounty hunters who police said burst into a home and menaced an innocent couple at gunpoint were arrested, the second time this month that authorities have dealt with such an incident.
Benjamin Twiggs, 29, and Timicka E. Ford-Cruz, 33, impersonated Reading police officers to get into the victims' apartment and "essentially terrorized these people," said Lt. Mark Talbot.
"That's not enforcing the law, that's committing a crime, and that's why they're locked up," Talbot said. "There's no reason why they should've been in that house."
Twiggs and Ford-Cruz banged on the couple's door around 1 p.m. Friday and pushed their way into the apartment with guns drawn, police said. They pointed one weapon at the man's head and pushed another against his rib cage, police said.
When the man's wife came out of the bathroom and asked what was happening, Ford-Cruz pointed a gun at her and told her to sit down, police said.
Twiggs pulled out a photo and showed it to the man. After the man denied he was that person, the bounty hunters left - still pointing their guns at the couple, police said.
The man followed them out, wrote down the car's license number and called police, who stopped the vehicle a short time later.
Twiggs and Ford-Cruz, of Philadelphia, were charged with impersonating a public servant, burglary, simple assault, recklessly endangering another person, harassment, unlawful restraint, false imprisonment, trespassing, conspiracy and possessing instruments of crime.
"This is an industry that desperately needs to be regulated," Talbot said. "Illegitimate acts like this make it even more dangerous for us as police to do our job because people don't know if they can trust us."
Bounty hunters Ramon Mercado Jr., 40, and Lester L. Kissinger Jr., 22, were arrested Sept. 4 after Reading police said they burst into a woman's home, handcuffed her and took her to their office for questioning because they could not find her fugitive ex-boyfriend.
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Information from: Reading Eagle,
http://www.readingeagle.com/
