startled a huge, fur-covered animal that was located about 50 yards from the van. He yelled to get Chuck's attention. The men watched, what they described as a "12 foot tall" fur-covered animal with "glowing, red eyes," run swiftly toward the western perimeter of the construction site⁽¹⁾. They said it ran on two legs, hunched over, with hands that hung to its knees. As it fled, they claimed, it bounded atop a 15 foot tall mound of earth, in one jump, proceeded in the direction of a flood drainage pond, and quickly vanished within the forest on the western edge of the site. Thoroughly shaken by what they had just seen, the men jumped into their van and drove to a fast-food restaurant several miles up the highway. At about 12:40 AM, they called 911 from a public phone outside the restaurant and reported what they had observed. In response to the 911 call, Anne Arundel County Police dispatched an unnamed officer who met them at the restaurant and took their statements⁽²⁾. Not wanting to return to the construction site, Chuck and Jerry asked the officer if there was a safe place they could park their van and sleep. The officer directed them to a nearby industrial park where they could spend the night.

Around 3:00 AM, they were awakened by Anne Arundel County Police officer, Nicholas DiPietro. Officer DiPietro, who at this time was not on duty, had been part of the nighttime Mall security detail. He asked them if they would return with him to Arundel Mills and show him where all the commotion had occurred several hours earlier. The men agreed, gave him the details of the incident, and led the officer back to the site. With DiPietro in a car and the two workers following in their van, they drove to the drainage pond area on the western border of the construction site. Officer DiPietro inspected the area with his floodlight. In the grass at the edge of the pond, approximately 300 feet away, they all spotted a large, dark shape, presumed to be an animal, sitting or lying near the water. In the beam cast by the floodlight they reported seeing red, glowing eyes from the dark shape. Expecting to get some response from the object, DiPietro sounded his vehicle's bullhorn several times. The powerful blasts elicited no reaction from the dark shape as it remained motionless and silent. After an undetermined period of time the shape slowly moved away from the pond and disappeared into the nearby woods (see Figure 2). At this point the witnesses decided to leave the area. Though DiPietro's car became stuck in the freshly excavated soil, with the aid of Chuck and Jerry's van he was freed and they returned to the more solid, central areas of the site. The workers returned to the industrial park for some much needed sleep.

What Officer DiPietro did beyond this point remains unclear. However, according to newspaper accounts, the 15 to 20 inch long "footprint" that DiPietro discovered was found when he and the workers returned to the site at 3:00 AM. At this writing, these details remain sketchy.

In looking for answers to the mystery, Mall officials and the Anne Arundel County Police Department enlisted the aid of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR). On Tuesday, August 1st, the DNR's Wildlife Division sent field investigator, Clifton Horton to examine the construction site. News articles on the DNR's involvement differed on what was or wasn't found, though the official opinion was that a bear had probably visited Arundel Mills. To provide clarity on

1. Mr. Arcilesi reported in his field notes that there was some disagreement (possibly due to excitement, brevity and distance) in their description as to whether the animal had two eyes or one eye in the center of its head.

2. Though police incident reports are supposedly in the public domain, with copies available for a nominal fee, we were told that this particular report is not available. Our attempts to obtain it have, thus far, failed.

Go To Page 6

Back to Page 4