
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, June 9, 1994                   TAG: 9406090048
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Matt Chittum
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

TRAFFIC HELD UP BY WOMAN LOCKED IN CAB OF PICKUP

Police were not sure why it took pepper spray to coax a Moneta woman from the cab of her pickup truck Wednesday afternoon while she held up traffic at the southbound on-ramp to Interstate 581 at Orange Avenue.

Sgt. P.B. Shumate said the woman stopped her car at the top of the on-ramp at about 4:30 p.m., got out for a few minutes then locked herself in the truck and lay down across the seat when police arrived.

The woman, whose name was not released, held a Virginia driver's license with a Moneta address, according to Shumate.

The tractor-trailers trying to enter I-581 could not get around the stopped truck, so traffic lined up around the ramp and down Orange Avenue as far as Williamson Road at times, Shumate said.

Police first tried to talk the woman out of the car. Shumate said she still had the keys, and police were concerned she would drive off.

After a half-hour standoff, police inserted a narrow tube around the edge of the door and sprayed pepper spray into the cab of the truck. The woman came out right away.

"[Pepper spray] is pretty persuasive stuff," Shumate said.

The woman didn't resist police much once she was out, Shumate said, but she had to be restrained on a stretcher before an ambulance could take her to a hospital for evaluation.

by CNB