Call Me!

Tall Tales Teaching Pack

Busy young robber leaves calling card

It's just after eight in the morning. A young man walks into car repair shop in Chicago.

18-year old Ruben Carate is wearing a mask. He is carrying a gun. He looks very scary.

Carate waves his gun at the employees behind the counter. ‘Open up the safe,’ he orders. ‘And give me all the money.’

The employees look nervously at each other. ‘We can’t do that,’ they tell the robber. ‘Only our boss has the combination to the safe. And he’s not here yet.’

The young robber is not happy. ‘When is he coming in?’ he asks.

‘We’re not sure,’ says a worker called Tony Diaz. ‘Some time before lunch.’

‘But I can’t wait here all morning!’ complains the robber. ‘I’ve got things to do.’

Here's my number

‘We could call you when our boss gets in,’ says Mr Diaz bravely.

There is a moment of tense silence. Mr Diaz looks at the Carate. The young robber stares back at him. He lifts his gun

Then to everyone’s amazement Carate nods his masked head. 'I'll give you my number.'

The thief carefully writes down his mobile number. 'Call me when your boss arrives,' he says.

‘Okay,’ says Mr Diaz.

Mr Carate backs out of the shop. He is still waving his gun at the employees. 'Call me!’ he warns. ‘Otherwise I'm going to come back to shoot you.'

'Okay, sir.'

Later that morning they do call Carate back. They also phone the Chicago police.

'I'm back!'

Just before midday Carate returns. Plain-clothes Chicago police officers are waiting for him. ‘Stay at the back of the shop,’ they tell the employees.

Carate walks in. He’s wearing the same clothes and the same mask. ‘I’m back,’ he shouts. ‘And I want the money now.’

But the man now standing behind the counter is a police officer. ‘Put your hands in the air!’ he tells Carate.

The look of amazement on Carate’s face quickly turns to fury. He does not put his hands up. Instead he tries to attack the police officer.

The police officer shoots. He wounds Carate in the leg.

No one could make this up!

‘It's pretty funny now, but it wasn't at the time,’ Diaz says.

‘No one could make this up," adds a police spokesman.

Carate is treated in hospital for a gunshot wound. He is then charged with attempted armed robbery and assaulting a police officer.

© 2013 Kieran McGovern Print Friendly and PDFPrint Friendly

Learning Activities

Tall Tales Teaching Packs contain ELT materials for online & classroom use. They include
- Original stories & simplified versions of classic texts.
- Short texts with reading comprehension
- Audio slideshows with learning activities
Kieran McGovern has been described as being 'amongst the best writers of language learner materials in English’.