Woodman's Thief Stashed a Crack Pipe In a Different 'Crack', Police Say

A 41-year-old Milwaukee man is accused of robbing Woodman’s in order to steal 10 bottles of liquor.

When he was apprehended, police found a crack pipe in his possession that had presumably been stashed inside another "crack".

Michale J. Tooley was charged in Waukesha County Circuit Court Friday with one count of armed robbery and one count of possession of drug paraphernalia. If convicted, he faces up to 25 years in prison and $100,000 in fines.

According to the criminal complaint:

At 9:07 a.m. Thursday, the liquor manager at Woodman’s was working in the department when several men came in wearing puffy jackets, which he thought was suspicious, so he began to look at the men via security cameras. One man grabbed a bottle of liquor, then asked the manager if he could get a case worth and seeing as the manager would need to leave the area, he called for assistance.

After 30 seconds no one came to his aid, so the manager quietly said into his microphone that men were trying to steal from the liquor department. Two of the men left the store and got into a car and drove off, while the third man—later identified as Tooley--was stopped by two other managers.

When confronted, Tooley then lunged at one of the managers with some sort of weapon, causing the manager to duck out of the way. Tooley then ran to a tractor trailer in the parking lot, where he got up on the side, talked with the driver for a little bit and then ran away toward Highway 41/45.

When officers reviewed security video footage of the incident, they saw Tooley take 10 bottles of liquor, hide them in his jacket and then swipe what looked like a knife at the manager. They called the tractor trailer driver and the man said Tooley said “they” were going to kill him and offered $5 for a ride and only left after the driver said he would call the cops.

While a Menomonee Falls police officer was responding to the call, he spotted Tooley walking parallel to the onramp to the expressway. When the officer turned around and got out of his squad, Tooley then began running through the gorge area until the officer lost sight of him.

The officer got back into his squad and then spotted Tooley running behind some homes at North 124th Street and West Fond du Lac Avenue, so he got out and chased after him again, eventually finding Tooley hiding behind a pine tree.

Tooley no longer had the puffy jacket on and was reaching for his groin area at the time. The jacket was later found near a fence with nine bottles of liquor and a metal bracket.

Tooley was wearing two pairs of jeans, said he did some “bad stuff last night,” and admitted to being at Woodman’s, but denied robbing it. While being searched, an officer found a crack pipe on the floor that smelled of feces and had blood on it after Tooley must have stashed it in his anus.

Tooley is currently being held in Waukesha County Jail on $100,000 bond while awaiting trial.