Lookout, shoplifters – here comes the Toronto Spider-Man.
A street performer dressed as Spidey swooped in to stop an alleged shoplifting incident Monday, at a downtown costume store on Halloween.
A video of the incident shows Mark Zilio, who goes by the name "Peter Parkour," stepping in to assist two security guards with a takedown outside the store. Zilio manages to get his arms around the female suspect, allowing the two security guards to catch up with and subdue her.
Staff at the store say the woman had purchased a costume but tried to leave with additional items she hadn't paid for. Security tried to stop her but she ran for it.
And that's when Spider-Man arrived.
"She was very squirmy," Zilio told CTV Toronto on Tuesday. The friendly neighbourhood wall-crawler says he was busking outside the costume shop when the incident took place, and felt a responsibility to step in.
"I never want to become involved in these things. I don't want to lose my busking license," he said, adding that he has no aspirations to turn the takedown into a full-time gig. Zilio says he'd much rather stick to climbing hydro boxes and showing off on the streets of Toronto, which he's done for the last four years. "I'm not trained to handle someone while they're hostile or needing to be held down," he said.
Nevertheless, store manager Sanjoy Kandu said he was grateful for the help. "It's a great thing," Kandu told CTV Toronto. "Peter Parkour helping out a security guard at that moment? It was great."
"Typical day in the life of Spider-Man," Zilio joked. He said he found it funny that he wound up fighting crime on "the one day when there's the most Spider-Men around," because of Halloween.
"With great power comes great responsibility," Zilio said.
With files from CTV Toronto
