FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — Roswell police have charged a man they said pulled a gun on a driver then ran from an officer who tried to intervene.
James Schumacher told Channel 2's Mike Petchenik he saw Theodore Riehl driving erratically on King Road near Hardscrabble Road last Thursday.
"I kept getting a little closer to get his license plate to call Roswell police," he told Petchenik.
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Schumacher said that’s when Riehl slammed on his brake and nearly caused an accident.
"That's when he pulled out a gun and said, 'I'm going to kill you,' and called me a 'snowflake,'" Schumacher said. "The last thing that went through my head is that I was about to get shot."
The Cartersville trucker told Petchenik he spotted an officer up the road and flagged him down for help.
"Within seconds, I was yelling at the cop and he had his lights on spinning around," he said.
Department spokesperson Lisa Holland told Petchenik that Riehl refused to stop for the officer, but after a short chase, she said Riehl did pull over.
"He did, in fact, have a gun in his car and also some illegal narcotics," Holland said.
She told Petchenik that Shumacher is lucky the situation didn't escalate even more than it did.
"You definitely never want to get into a confrontation on the road in these situations because sometimes they don't end very well," she said. "A lot of times, you see people get hurt, or they actually get into fist fights or the worst, that somebody could get shot and killed."
Schumacher told Petchenik he'd like to see Riehl punished for running from the officer.
"I believe in the Second Amendment, but this is a case in point of some people should have background checks," he said. "Unstable people should be monitored much better."
He said he's thankful he wasn't hurt.
"I feel like that's where I went wrong," he said. "I got too close to get his license plate for the police, and that's what caused the issue."
Petchenik reached out to Riehl at a phone number he found for him but, as of Wednesday afternoon, had not heard back.