Who needs luck when you’ve got Facebook?
Capt. Kathe Fannon of Cortez told The Islander Feb. 25 that her husband’s bait truck — stolen Feb. 20 — was recovered thanks to the social media site.
Mike Fannon, who runs Mike’s Live Bait, uses the Ford F-150 truck custom-fitted with a flatbed tank designed to hold live shrimp for deliveries to nearby bait and tackle shops.
The truck was stolen around 2 a.m. Feb. 20 when a crewmember in charge of delivery to the Skyway Bait & Tackle in Terra Ceia exited the vehicle to enter the bait shop and a man jumped in and drove off, according to Kathe Fannon.
Fannon, who runs Captain Kathe and First Mate Pup-Pup Charters, said the truck was carting more than 5,000 live shrimp.
“I even said to the cops, ‘They can have the truck, but we need that flatbed,’” she said. “It would take my husband another two weeks to build that, and you just don’t haul 5,000-8,000 shrimp around. You’ve got to have some really special stuff. You don’t just throw that together.”
The crewmember called Mike Fannon, who picked him up from the delivery stop in his own vehicle, and they searched for the truck until about 5 a.m.
They also searched later that day, to no avail.
Capt. Katie Scarlett Tupin, the Fannons’ daughter and another charter boat captain, posted on Facebook, alerting others to the theft. Her post was shared 744 times and received more than a hundred comments.
The Fannons received a phone call about 6 p.m. the same day from someone who saw the post and also the truck. The witness said the truck was heading into woods in east Bradenton near 18th Avenue East and 47th Terrace East.
Mike Fannon and a crewmember drove to the area and found the truck and the flatbed shrimp tank abandoned near a “homeless camp,” as described by Kathe Fannon.
The Manatee County Sheriff’s Office was called to recover the truck.
Fannon said law enforcement arrived with dogs, two helicopters and eight police vehicles, but didn’t make an arrest or conduct a search because no suspect was at the scene.
However, several people told deputies a man called “Frankie Two-Tats” stole the truck.
The MCSO arrested Albert Franklin Hill — whose nickname is “Frankie Two-Tats” — Feb. 22 for carjacking without a weapon. He remained in police custody as of Feb. 26.
Kathe Fannon said deputies told her Hill stole the truck after being released from the Manatee County jail because he needed a ride to Somerset about 40 miles away and had no vehicle.
The police released the truck to Mike Fannon, who called the American Automobile Association to fit a new key since the original wasn’t found.
The shrimp in the truck were found dead and rotting.
“The sheriff’s department would have never found that truck. Ever. It was my thanks to my husband, his crewmember and Facebook, that this even happened,” Kathe Fannon said.