Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, August 5, 1995 TAG: 9508070035
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARY BISHOP
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But spit?
That's a different kind of precipitation.
Thursday afternoon, according to police, a man approached the 59-year-old carrier at his truck and asked for his mail. Tuck told him carriers aren't allowed to hand people mail from their vehicles.
The man cursed him, Tuck told police.
Deborah Yackley, a spokeswoman for the Postal Service's mid-Atlantic area, said the man and his friends then harassed Tuck as he delivered mail.
Back in the truck, Tuck told police, the instigator threw a lighted cigarette inside and spat in Tuck's face. The two fought as neighbors watched.
Yackley said Tuck was treated at a hospital for his wounds, which police said included scratches on his face and cuts on his elbows. "It's fairly serious," said Yackley. Somebody had to finish Tuck's route and he will be out of work a few days.
Police arrested Shannon Lee Short, 20, of the 100 block of Windward Drive Southwest, and charged him with assault and battery.
At home Friday morning, Tuck said postal inspectors advised him not to talk about the incident. Paul English with the National Association of Letter Carriers said it's pretty rare for something like this to happen in Roanoke. "Occasionally from time to time we do have altercations or a carrier gets assaulted - about every couple of years."
Yackley said being a mail carrier can be dangerous, even lethal. She has known of carriers being shot, bitten and stabbed.
Near Charlottesville not long ago, she said, a rural carrier was attacked by somebody's pet turkey.
by CNB