ROSEVILLE –

Sophia Shaw said she’d dreamed of getting a purple and green BMX for months. She finally got one for her birthday last year but just last week, it was stolen.

A few days later, kids in the neighborhood told her family they saw he bike. So Sophia’s father got in his car to hunt down his daughter’s bike. He found it just a few miles away in front of The Dollar Store on Harding Boulevard.

He says he saw 37-year-old Omar Mercardo hop on the bike and ride away. Sophia’s dad called police, who eventually arrested the suspect.

Sophia, 9, saw everything unfold and was surprised by how it ended.

“He tried to run and then the cop Superman-tackled him and we were like, ‘Whoa! What happened!?” she said.

“He [the officer] must have played some college ball or something because he left the ground when he dove for the guy,” said Neil Shaw.

Mercado was arrested for burglary, drug possession, possessing stolen property, resisting arrest and a warrant for drug possession.

He was booked at Placer County Jail and his bail is for $260,000.