Man unwittingly drives getaway car after theft

A man was stopped by an employee when he tried to walk out of Lowes, 1200 W. Burleigh St., with $188 worth of copper wire. The man told the employee to "back off before I pull this," the Wauwatosa police report states.

What "this" referred to was never discovered because the employee immediately backed off.

Also in the report:

Two men put the copper wire in a backpack at 2 p.m. Sept. 20 before leaving the store separately. One of them was stopped at the door. After his encounter with the employee, he ran to a getaway car and both men drove off.

Police were able to get the license plate number of the car, which belonged to a Milwaukee woman. They called the woman, who said she had no knowledge of the incident but that her husband was using the car at the time.

The husband said that he was helping his friends with errands and that he was in the car at the time of attempted theft.

He said that when the two men returned to the car he asked them what had happened in the store because he thought they were behaving suspiciously. According to him they said they had gotten into an argument with employees as they tried to return items.

The husband gave a description of the men who he was with and one of them matched a suspect in a previous scrap metal theft.

Police don't believe the husband was involved.