Las Vegans recall encounter with kidnapper

Keith Paul

Friday, Aug. 2, 2002 | 9:16 a.m.

Roy Ratliff thought he had found an easy victim when he spotted a little old lady getting into her car at her downtown Las Vegas home. He was wrong.

There was more fight in 64-year-old Bobbe Young then Ratliff could have imagined -- and that only increased when he faced Young's protective 69-year-old husband, James.

The couple's violent encounter with the 37-year-old Ratliff happened two weeks before the convicted felon kidnapped two teenage girls from Lancaster, Calif., early Thursday.

After his getaway car got stuck Thursday, Ratliff tried to run away and leave the girls behind, but he was shot and killed by California authorities.

Thursday afternoon Bobbe and James Young sat in separate rooms at Metro Police's robbery office and looked at a group of six photos. Each pointed to a picture of Ratliff, identifying him as the one who attacked and robbed them, police said.

Bobbe Young knew nothing of Ratliff's past when he walked up to her on July 18. She didn't know he had been wanted for about a year in California for skipping out on his parole and that he had been accused of sexual assault.

She only knew there was some guy asking for money approaching her as she was coming out of her house.

"I told him I didn't have any money and he started charging at me," Bobbe Young said. "I keyed the lock real quick and tried to get in, but he pushed the door open and put me in a headlock."

The 5-foot, not even 100-pound woman started struggling with her much-larger attacker. Ratliff squeezed her neck as she fought, demanding her car keys.

Bobbe Young hit the horn button on the car-lock remote control, hoping to get the attention of her husband of 47 years, who was inside.

James Young didn't know anything was wrong. He didn't hear his wife's screams and thought the horn was just to get him to hurry.

But Bobbe Young was still fighting. She was scared, but apparently she was more mad than scared.

"He told me to give him the keys and I told him to get them himself," she said.

She pushed her purse toward Ratliff, and as he was rummaging through the purse looking for the keys she grabbed his glasses and tossed them under their RV parked in the driveway.

"He started trying to push me into the passenger seat. I knew he was going to take me for a ride and I didn't want to go with him," Bobbe Young said. "I held onto the emergency brake for dear life. I'd seen enough to know if you get into a car with a kidnapper, you are probably going to end up dead somewhere."

As she screamed and struggled, her husband looked out the door and saw a man with his arm around his wife's neck. He rushed outside.

"I was screaming for him to let my wife go," James Young said. "He turned and pulled out what I thought was a knife, but it was a gun. He said, 'I'll kill you. Give me your money.' "

James Young pulled out $100 and threw it on the ground. Ratliff barked he wanted it all. James Young pulled about about $160 more and threw it over the car door to scatter it.

Ratliff let go of Bobbe Young and scampered to pick up the money.

"I yelled for her to run, but she didn't," James Young said. His wife explained that she didn't want her husband to get shot.

"I was going to jump on (Ratliff's) back," she said.

But after her husband told her again to run, Bobbe Young went to a neighbor's house to call police as Ratliff picked up most the cash and drove away in their gray 1999 four-door Saturn.

When the car turned up Thursday morning at the scene of the California kidnapping, police called the couple. They talked with detectives and gave a description for a sketch that police said looked like Ratliff.

Police praised the couple for their help Thursday and for fighting to survive their ordeal with Ratliff.

"Those two gave him all he could handle and I know that he wasn't expecting that," Lt. Ted Snodgrass of Metro's robbery unit said. "He was thinking this is going to be a cakewalk."

The couple, Las Vegas residents since 1975, said they know how close they came to being harmed and were just happy that the two California girls were found.

"We're very thankful those girls are all right," Bobbe Young said.

James Young said, "We're just very fortunate that (Ratliff) didn't punch (Bobbe) or take her."