Ex-Bully Makes Amends

No two ways about it: Tony Winters was a bully of a boy.

Brawny and brash, he would cruise the grounds of his junior high school in San Antonio, preying on weaker kids. Being tough was a way of life, an ego boost, a tonic for the adolescent blues.

But now memories of those youthful pursuits--the noses he bloodied, the eyes he blackened--fill Winters with remorse. So he has set out to atone for his sins, embarking on a one-man crime-fighting crusade that would make Captain Marvel proud.

‘Helping Somebody’

In the last three years, Winters, 21, estimates he has nabbed more than a score of would-be criminals in the act, detaining the suspects until police could arrive. Rapists, burglars, spouse-beaters, hit-and-run drivers--this beefy warehouse foreman from Lakeside has stopped them all, merely, he says, for the satisfaction of “helping somebody in trouble.” By his count, six of the arrests have resulted in convictions.

“I don’t feel too good about my past,” said Winters, a plain-spoken father of two who has kept his anti-crime mission a secret from friends because he fears they might poke fun. “So, I’m trying to do something good now. I’m just trying to do my part, help out when I see something bad.”

Take, for example, the episode that unfolded in downtown San Diego just the other day. Winters was at work at ESD Electric Supplies Distributing Co. when he spotted three suspicious-looking men snooping around a parked pickup truck. As he watched, the men jimmied their way into the vehicle. When he approached the suspects, they fled.

In an instant, Winters gave chase. Enlisting speed he developed as a high school football player, he chugged after the alleged burglars, arms pumping like pistons. Overtaking one of the suspects on Harbor Drive, Winters wrestled the man to the ground, pinning him under his 240-pound bulk while a passer-by summoned police. Minutes later, Losano Gilberto-Viasenor of Tijuana was arrested on suspicion of auto burglary. Police found knobs from the truck’s radio in his pockets.

“I see myself as a person looking out for everyone else,” said Winters, who is barrel-chested and has arms like tree trunks. “I don’t look for crime, but it seems to come to me. And if I see it, I have to get involved . . . I’d sure hope somebody would do the same for me.”

Because Winters has not kept a written log of the criminals he’s corraled or the victims he’s aided, police could not confirm the bulk of the arrests he has made. Still, a computer check did verify his involvement in six 1986 cases--including assault with a deadly weapon and attempted rape--and one 1987 case.

‘More Than Average Citizen’

“There could be more, but that’s more than the average citizen right there,” said Bill Robinson, spokesman for the San Diego Police Department. “If this guy has not expressed an interest in the law enforcement field as of yet, he should check it out.”

The district attorney’s office, meanwhile, was able to confirm two convictions stemming from citizen’s arrests made by Winters. In one case, Antonio Santana was convicted of assault on Dec. 31, 1986, sentenced to three years probation and fined $300. Earlier that year, another villain captured by Winters--Roberto Villanueva--was convicted of sexual battery.

Meanwhile, Gilberto-Viasenor, the alleged auto burglar Winters tackled on Harbor Drive on Tuesday, is being held on $10,000 bail in the County Jail downtown.

Though unfamiliar with his work, law enforcement authorities generally applauded Winters’ anti-crime mission, praising him for his drive to make society a safer place. But they cautioned that well-meaning civilians can endanger themselves and others by tangling with targets who may have them outmatched.

“We certainly don’t want to discourage people from doing a good deed, but we don’t want them to get in trouble, either,” said Steve Casey, a spokesman for the district attorney’s office. “There are situations where a citizen should simply not get involved and should instead round up a sworn law enforcement officer who is trained for this sort of thing.”

Peter Lehman, chief of the district attorney’s appellate division, noted that citizens who intervene on behalf of police risk being sued if they should make a false arrest or injure a suspect.

Other times, people can be disappointed if charges are not pressed against criminals they catch. “It can turn out to be a frustrating experience,” Lehman said.

Not Fretting

Winters, an affable, boyish-faced man crowned with bushy black hair, says frustration is one emotion he has yet to encounter during his career as a volunteer crime-fighter. Although lamenting that only six of his catches have been convicted, he believes “everyone deserves a second chance,” and figures that “the system will take care of the bad guys one way or another.”

As for worries that he might get hurt or become the target of a lawsuit, Winters isn’t fretting. He neither prepares for his encounters with criminals through weightlifting or other training nor carries a weapon. Still, Winters says he’s been able to outwit most of his targets through a combination of “common sense” and an ability to “think like the bad guy.” His most serious injury was a wound to the stomach inflicted by a screwdriver.

Winters tries to keep up to speed on the less-glamorous side of law enforcement as well. When he’s got a spare hour, he pores over the state Penal Code and other tomes at the downtown law library, in part to stay abreast of the rights of suspects and what charges and penalties they may face in a given case.

“I try to be well-informed,” Winters said, “and I’m careful. So far, I haven’t gotten (seriously) hurt. But my fiancee, Roberta, still worries a lot. I tell her it goes with the territory.”

A self-described “full-time family man,” Winters lives in “the boonies” of Lakeside in a modest, two-bedroom apartment with Roberta and their two daughters, Amanda and Nicole. When he’s not working or busting crooks, Winters likes to play pinball and spend time with his girls. He’s also a “news junkie,” keeping up with several newspapers and periodicals and watching about two hours of television news a day.

Began Four Years Ago

Winters said his “get involved, ask questions later” attitude about crime developed about four years ago, not long after he moved to San Diego. Guilt about his past as a schoolyard tough began to get to him, and a lifelong barrage of advice from his father and grandmother started to sink in, sparking a change in his outlook, Winters said.

“I decided that to be a winner in life, you had to start by being a good person and helping out others wherever you can,” said Winters, who was forced to drop out of high school as a junior and get a job when his grandmother underwent heart surgery. “I decided that if our society was going to remain a good one and not become a mad, dog-eat-dog world, everybody had to start doing what they could.”

His first foray into crime-fighting involved a hit-and-run accident in 1984. After observing a driver run a red light, clip another car and drive on, Winters gave chase, pursuing the car two miles in his own vehicle and then continuing the hunt on foot. Winters ultimately caught the errant driver.

His most memorable and heartwarming deed, Winters recalled, came in January, 1986, when he caught a suspect who had forced his way into a woman’s apartment while she was showering.

“I was working at a restaurant then and I was taking out the trash when I heard screams,” he recalled. “I looked over and saw a woman trying to climb down a tree from her second-floor room. She was screaming in Spanish that a man was trying to rape her. Then I saw a guy with a knife coming after her. I managed to flip him and hold him on the ground until the police got there.”

Winters later testified against the suspect, Roberto Villanueva, who pleaded guilty to sexual battery and was sentenced to three years’ probation, including seven months in custody.

Not surprisingly, this volunteer peacekeeper says he dreams of becoming a police officer. The opportunity to earn a living rescuing victims from the clutches of crime is one he would relish, said Winters. But he has yet to apply for such a position.