Tamarac Resident Mark Rohmann receives a Certificate of Appreciation from BSO Captain Neal Glassman and the City Commission. (Photo Courtesy City of Tamarac)
By: Sharon Aron Baron
On March 29, Tamarac resident Mark Rohmann was in his office when he heard something outside brushing against the sides of his house. Moving into his kitchen, he noticed two men trying to break his window.
The men noticed him as well, and suddenly ran towards the front of the house to their car which was parked in his driveway. Rohmann ran through his house, hoping to beat them to their car.
But the men made it into the car first, and Rohmann had only enough time to grab the driver’s side door. He said he wanted to rip it off its hinges, but noticing that the driver had his leg still out of the car, Rohmann slammed the door into it several times. Once the driver got his foot inside the car, Rohmann reached down and grabbed a landscape boulder to bash into the car’s windshield, but the suspects sped away and Rohmann was left standing with a boulder over his head.
Rohmann, who said he was both “livid and mad” about the incident insisted he typically wasn’t aggressive like that.
“When I was younger, I was a hockey player and hard to handle,” said the Chicago native and grandfather of five. “After the incident, I called my mom and said, ‘It’s still there,’ and I told her what I did.”
Rohmann had reason to be concerned about crime in the area. “The house next door to me was robbed two or three months ago, then a month before that, a house next door to them,” said Rohmann. “That family moved out because they were afraid to live here.”
But the story wasn’t over yet. In the end, Rohmann provided something valuable for police: while the men were leaving, he took down a partial tag number on the car.
It was because of the tag number that the Burglary and Crime Suppression Team were able to conduct an investigation which included surveillance over the next two weeks. This would eventually track the two men to Plantation where they would be arrested while committing a burglary.
“These subjects were responsible for two break-ins in the Woodlands community, and we believe ten additional break-ins inside the Mainlands Six community.” said BSO Captain Neal Glassman.
Rohmann was surprised to find out that the men who attempted to burglarize his home weren’t 27 or 28 as he had suspected, instead were only 17 years old.
On June 11, Rohmann was presented with a certificate for his commitment to the safety and well-being for the citizens of Tamarac by Captain Glassman.
“This case is just exceptional in the amount of burglaries this crew was committing,” said Glassman. “It was an act like this of Mr Rohmann getting involved, getting a tag number, being that key piece to assist us in arresting this crew.”
