Maddox Nabs 2 in Robberies

Ken Maddox has always considered himself to be tough on crime. On Monday, the Republican Assemblyman from Garden Grove had a chance to prove it.

Maddox, a part-time reserve officer for the Tustin Police Department, helped arrest two men whom authorities suspect of robbing two Tustin banks.

The California Federal branch on 17th Street and Citibank on Irvine Boulevard were robbed within 30 minutes of each other. Witnesses gave similar descriptions of the robbers in each crime, investigators said.

Maddox was one of the first officers to arrive at Citibank. He and another officer spotted Carlos Mellizo, 21, and David Mellizo, 19, getting into a white pickup truck outside the bank. The brothers, both of Murrieta, matched the descriptions of the Tustin robbers, authorities said, and may have been involved in earlier bank heists in Orange and Riverside counties.

Maddox said he used his patrol car to cut off the truck, then held the two men at gunpoint while he and other officers waited for backup.

It was just another day at work, said Maddox, who was a full-time police officer in Tustin for more than seven years before being elected to the Assembly in 1998.

“I’ve been involved in [investigating] just about every crime you can think of, I suppose,” he said.

Maddox, 36, said he tries to keep a low profile on the job but couldn’t quite manage to do so Monday. “I guess members of the state Assembly don’t go around arresting people for bank robbery,” he said.