You’ve all heard the saying “we live in a society where pizza arrives quicker than the police“, right?

Sounds a bit harsh, but believe it or not, it’s actually true.

Yesterday, Victoria Police put out a call* for the public to help locate registered sex offender Maurice Collie, believed to be in the Norlane area of Geelong.

(* The above link is broken, quite possibly because the offender has since been located and arrested…)

Just a day later, Maurice Collie was spotted in the vicinity of the Labuan Square Shopping Centre in Forster Street, Norlane, by locals with an eye on the ball.

Police were seeking Maurice Collie because he had failed to keep them informed of his address, a requirement of his registration as a sex offender under the Sex Offender Registration Act 2004.

The Addy has all the news!

Just after midday, the Geelong Advertiser ran the story titled Geelong citizen’s arrest as sex offender held in Norlane street, authored by Olivia Shying, informing the public of the arrest of Maurice Collie.

The Geelong Advertiser spread the news by posting the article to their Facebook page, which produced this gem of a comment from somebody in the know…

According to the above post, Maurice Collie was spotted in Norlane when a chap was taking his son to Avalon Airport, which according to Google Maps is approximately a 30km round trip, which should take about half an hour, not including the time to unload the car and say goodbye to the traveler.

So let’s assume it took between 45 minutes to an hour to perform the journey to the airport and back from Norlane, and I allow an hour, as the comment from the Geelong Advertiser Facebook page above also mentions, the chap who spotted Maurice Collie also called into the Corio Police Station en-route to the airport to report the sighting.

The journey from Corio Police Station to Forster Street, Norlane is 3km, around 6 minutes by car, according to Google Maps.

Since Maurice Collie was later spotted and held by the public in Station Street, Norlane, that 6 minutes now pads out to 7 minutes for police to arrive on the scene, again according to Google Maps.

Let’s give police time to prepare, which in such cases should take about 10 minutes, so there’s approximately 15 minutes you’d expect to wait for police – because you’re performing a citizens arrest here, a potentially dangerous act, and you’d think they’d be more than willing to take over the role of ‘catch an offender‘, eh?

Public safety and all being a priority of the force…

Who feels like pizza?

Granted, it’s 9am in the morning, you’re going to be hard pressed to find a pizza delivery at that time of the day, so just like the DIY policing that’s becoming more and more common of late, you’re going to have settle for DIY pizza as well.

Again, according to the comment left on the Geelong Advertiser Facebook page, the police are still an hour and a half away, so you might as well feast on the good stuff and enjoy the wait!

Easy! Waltz to the supermarket at Labuan Square Shopping Centre to purchase yourself a frozen pizza.

You may as well take the sex offender with you, because you’ve already informed the police you have the guy!

If you’re shopping at Labuan Square Shopping Centre to begin with, chances are you’re just a 10 minute walk away from the supermarket.

Let’s call half an hour in total to source that pizza, being time to walk to the supermarket, time to walk back, and time talk a bit of shit along the way to locals out for their morning walk.

Don’t drive.

You need to walk because exercise is good for you and pizza will go straight to your waistline!

I suggest you go the pepperoni… at least you can tell what’s on the bloody thing sticking with that choice.

Hey, frozen pizza is still better than no pizza at all, right?

Mmm, pizza!

Now you’ve got a citizens arrest in progress here, and a frozen pizza that needs to end up in your belly somehow.

Time is important, so you’ll need to microwave that frozen pizza unfortunately, which should take about 5-10 minutes, compared to over half an hour in the oven.

Everybody knows frozen pizza requires an oven to be pre-heated, which will waste time you haven’t got.

By the time you’ve sourced, cooked and eaten your pizza, the police should be there, after three calls, and a 90 minute wait!

Have the sex offender do the dishes, because he might as well make himself useful somehow.

You’ve still got plenty of time to contact the Geelong Advertiser to keep them informed, because they’re too stingy to send out a reporter to cover the story, leaving them to beg on Facebook for details.

Oh, snap!

David Stubbs already pointed out that novel idea! 😀

For once, you can believe something you’ve read on the internet, in this case,

We live in a society where pizza arrives quicker than the police!

Sad, but also true.

(Keep an eye out for Jerry Lewis in the video below, who passed away just yesterday… a comic legend that kept me entertained throughout my childhood… and many others I assume. RIP bloke, you’ve earned your rest!)