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TIMES LEADER/JOHN E. KASKO
Saturday, February 05, 2000 Page: 2A
“Feisty” Irene Rinehamer displays the Liz Pearson Citizen of the Year Award
presented by U.S. Marshall Walter Sokolowski on Friday afternoon at the
Federal Courthouse in Wilkes-Barre. Rinehamer, 77, was attacked by escaped
serial arsonist Anthony Yang on Aug. 19 in the parking lot of Gerrity’s
Supermarket in the Dundee Shopping Center in Hanover Township. Yang and
cellmate Michael McCloskey, prisoners at the State Correctional Facility at
Dallas at the time, escaped several days prior to the incident. When attacked
by Yang, Rinehamer held onto her keys and warded off the would-be carjacker.
Rinehamer later gave her eyeglasses to police, who lifted a fingerprint off
one of the lenses and matched it to Yang’s. Rinehamer, of Nanticoke, said she
was honored to receive the citation. `I just thought I was doing everything I
could. It’s an honor and a pleasure in my old age that this came about,’ she
said as she started to cry. Sokolowski said about 75 people annually are
nominated for the award.