By Brian Anderson
Valley Times

July 26, 2001

OAKLAND — On the run for three days with little sleep and nearly no food, Thomas Wheelock was somber and respectful after being pulled over on a Utah interstate on Thanksgiving in 1997, a highway patrolman said Wednesday.

Wheelock had killed a fellow armored car guard days before and fled San Ramon with nearly $300,000. He sounded calm, however, looked only tired and appeared a bit nervous — not unlike many people stopped by authorities, said Sgt. Randall Richey.

But not long before the stop, authorities back in California had registered Wheelock’s new Ford Bronco in the National Crime Information Computer. Wheelock’s run had come to an end.

“I was extremely shocked,” Richey testified Wednesday as he recounted the encounter in an Oakland courtroom. “At that time, I called for backup. I kind of wanted to maintain a low profile; I didn’t want him to know that I knew anything until my backup got there.” A highway patrolman and a Centerville police officer were on the scene minutes later. Wheelock surrendered to them without incident.

Recording the scene was a camera in Richey’s cruiser.

“What happened?” Richey asked Wheelock at the time, his words replaying for jurors Wednesday.

“I just flipped out. I just … I was going to lose my job,” Wheelock could be heard saying on the tape as a stream of cars and trucks roared passed.

Quiet, calm and seat belted into the passenger side of Richey’s patrol car, Wheelock was captured on tape looking out the side window as a light rain fell from the gloomy sky overhead.

“His mood was definitely somber,” said Richey, a nine-year member of the Utah Highway Patrol.

Defense attorney Michael Ogul has said Wheelock was planning to surrender before he was stopped.

Detective Robert Hunt Jr. of Utah’s Davis County Sheriff’s Department testified Wednesday that two guns were found in the Bronco after Wheelock was arrested. A 9mm handgun with no clip, but a bullet in the chamber was found under the seat while a .38-caliber revolver was discovered in a cooler with “a lot of money,” Hunt said.

Wheelock is charged with killing Rodrigo Cortez, 30, of Pittsburg then ditching the armored car they were in behind a San Ramon auto parts store. He faces the death penalty if convicted.