'Resourceful' dad performs citizen's arrest, locks crook in cupboard
A Port Melbourne father has performed a dramatic citizen's arrest in his own home, wrestling a thief to the ground and then locking him in a wheelie bin cupboard until police arrived.
In the early hours of Tuesday morning, David Mann and his wife, Nicola, were woken by a noise in their car port.
Mr Mann went outside to check and found someone had scaled his fence and was trying to break into his car.
"I came racing out of the back door in my underwear ... and I've grabbed the guy, tried to wrestle him to the ground," Mr Mann said.
They wrestled until Mr Mann had the upper hand, then he turned his wheelie bin cupboard into a makeshift holding cell.
He ordered the thief to remove the wheelie bins, pushed him in, and used one of his kid's toys to hold the door in place until police arrived.
"Pulled the handle off the scooter here and jammed it into the door until the police came," Mr Mann said.
Mrs Mann said her husband's call to lock the crook in the cupboard while they waited for police is typical of his resourcefulness.
"Look, my husband is the master of improvisation," she laughed.
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"Pushed to the limit, he shines. And I think it was another shining example in our marriage of him fixing the problem."
It's understood the man had targeted a number of properties on Monday night and hadn't met with any resistance until he arrived in Port Melbourne.
Mr Mann said when he leapt into action he didn't give it a second thought and was simply acting on instinct.
"I didn't do anything that nobody else would do," he said.
An 18-year-old man was arrested and now faces a number of property and theft-related offences.
