Store clerk hailed as hero for stopping alleged kidnapping

A convenience store clerk in Philadelphia is being hailed as a hero after putting himself directly between a suspected carjacker and a doctor whom the suspect had allegedly abducted from a parking garage.
 

Manveer Komer was working the overnight shift Wednesday at a gas station in the Port Richmond neighborhood of Philadelphia when the suspect arrived with the female doctor, according to ABC station WPVI-TV in Philadelphia.

"I was looking,” Komer said. “This is not a boyfriend, not a girlfriend.” Komer’s suspicions that something was not right led him to take action.

Surveillance video appears to show the doctor and the suspect inside the gas station, with the suspect using the doctor’s credit card to buy cigarettes. As they were leaving, Komer came from behind the counter and stopped the doctor, physically putting himself between her and the suspect.

“You come behind my back. I help you. No problem,” Komer says to the woman, as captured by surveillance cameras.

Komer also confronted the suspect, whom Komer said reached into his pocket as if he had a gun, before driving off in the victim’s car.

The suspect turned on the victim’s cellphone after he left the gas station, which was the key that eventually allowed police to find the vehicle.

Authorities arrested Nathaniel Rodriguez and charged him with aggravated assault, kidnapping, carjacking, robbery and other related offenses, according to WPVI.

The suspect allegedly abducted the doctor from a parking garage around 6 a.m. Wednesday, the station reported.