Print

Email story

Comment

Letter to the editor

Nothing could stop this delivery

Not even a bullet through the leg was enough to keep a driver from making his pizza delivery rounds.

By BRIAN WHITE
Published June 7, 2005

TAMPA - Normally, making four pizza deliveries wouldn't seem like a big deal. But Thomas Stefanelli did it Saturday night after a would-be robber put a hole in his leg with a .32-caliber bullet.

Stefanelli, 37, said it was "dedication" that drove him to make the deliveries while he was bleeding in his Jeep.

He was shot in the thigh about 10:30 p.m. after arriving to make a delivery, only to realize the address was a vacant home. A man in a Halloween mask approached Stefanelli, pointed a revolver at him and demanded money.

Stefanelli, who goes by "Taz" when he's making deliveries for Hungry Howie's Pizza on E Hillsborough Avenue, said he began to fight with the man. Two shots were fired. One hit Stefanelli, but he did not immediately notice the wound.

Stefanelli said another man then came up and began yelling. Stefanelli said the two then ran into a nearby house.

"They figured they were going to make an easy mark by robbing a pizza delivery person," Tampa police spokesman Joe Durkin said.

"I was going to run them over," Stefanelli said.

Stefanelli then noticed the wound in his leg. His cell phone wasn't working, so he drove to his next delivery address, where he called his boss to ask him to call the police.

Stefanelli then left to make three more deliveries, with a wound that went through his thigh. "It bled a little bit, not much," he said.

He was taken to St. Joseph's Hospital, where an X-ray showed no serious damage. He was treated and released.

"He was very lucky that the bullet didn't strike a major artery or cause some kind of permanent injury or death," Durkin said.

Durkin said police have made no arrests but have identified several suspects.

Tampa police recovered the bullet at the hospital. It was in Stefanelli's back pocket.

"It hit my wallet and wouldn't go any farther and just fell into my pocket," Stefanelli said.

Stefanelli plans to stay at his job at Hungry Howie's. He said it was the first time he had been robbed in the three years he has been delivering pizzas.

Another Hungry Howie's employee had his pizza truck stolen once, Stefanelli said.

"He got it back the same day," he said. "They tried to sell the pizzas down the street."

[Last modified June 7, 2005, 02:15:48]