*nodding*

OPSEC was broken by somebody with knowledge... happens every time.  

I trust you evicted her?

I would have preferred to see somebody like that living under a bridge... but justice is seldom as complete as all that.  

That should give you some idea of just how predatory animals work. It's revolting, but it's life.

I was referring to the fat slag the attempted murderer was shacked up with....but whatever works.

I'm just really glad the scumbag wasn't using a Colt Detective's Special!



I was going to ask if your friends had reconsidered their position on CCW, but I see you covered that above.  Good for them.

I missed that quote earlier...but it should be noted that all bad guys are not completely clueless idiots.

Most violent criminals have been predators for a long time. They've actually developed a fairly sophisticated sense for what prey acts like and the characteristics of people who have fangs. They can also pick up on subtle body language cues that others might miss...like members of a small group of people all looking at one guy signaling unconsciously that he's most likely the guy with a plan. A bad guy can be sophisticated enough to pick that up. In fact, it's something that retired police officers or off-duty cops can encounter as people who know them can look to them in a bad situation betraying their badge.

Some bad guys react to that by fleeing. Some react to that by getting violent. You never know which you've got in front of you ahead of time.

Bad guys test and prod with all sorts of schemes and behaviors they've picked up from observation or from their criminal brethren whom they often team up with for the purposes of victimizing people. (Like the scumbag who shot Blitz did with that fat slag) To believe they are all mindless idiots who have no skill or sophistication is foolhardy. Nearly every violent criminal is or has been at one point a con man in another criminal endeavor...playing people's emotions like a fiddle. Witness the number of bad guys who turn from attempted murder into blubbering beggar if the tables get turned. It's not remorse...it's a strategy designed to work on people who have a functional conscience like most of their prey has. They seared their conscience long ago.

Thankfully the vast majority of my learning has been second hand from people much smarter than me who have made some of the insights I simply repeat. I've recently encountered a number of arguments about what the average joe is likely to face versus what a law enforcement officer is likely to face that brings your unfortunate incident to mind. I come from the school of thought that says the bad guys the cops go after with issued sidearms, good ammo, body armor, and priority backup is the guy Average Joe is going to have to face with just a smaller sidearm and all the protection offered by a polo shirt and a 911 call. Some others disagree with that for their own reasons...some sensible enough and based in statistics. Some more wishful thinking than anything else, in my non-professional opinion.

I mention it because your experience is the sort of thing that isn't supposed to happen according to a lot of folks. Bad guys are supposed to piss themselves and run when confronted by somebody who has a gun. That's the script that a lot of people have in their head because of Gary Kleck's survey and other anecdotes taken from news stories and what have you. Some believe that criminals are largely morons with a low pain tolerance who will flee when they figure they've met somebody who can bite back.

...and yet when you find out about people who commit crimes you find out that while there are certainly crimes of opportunity, a fair number of the criminals have done some homework like your guy did. They have a significant criminal history and aren't strangers to violence. In fact, they're typically VASTLY more experienced in violent interaction with others than your average joe is....than even your average cop is. When they get locked up for an offense they get put in a big box with a bunch of other sociopaths who have formed sophisticated networks to traffic drugs and game the prison system to do everything from smuggle in drugs to make opportunities for rape and murder happen.

Sure, there are a lot of bad guys out there who will piss themselves and run when confronted by somebody who even looks like they can effectively fight back. There are even times when a hardcore bad man can be so surprised by a dude who whips out a gun that in a moment of blind human fear he shits himself and runs. It certainly happens...but it is also true that there are bad guys who don't give a fuck and are determined to win. There are bad guys who will react to a dude that whips out a gun by shitting themselves as they're pulling the trigger rather than simply running away.

My contention has always been that if you're in a situation where you are having to pull the trigger on a firearm while deliberately aiming at another human being and you aren't a SWAT cop who has kicked down a door or a dude in the military who is doing the same or has laid an ambush for his enemy, then it's a pretty good bet that some shit has gone horribly, horribly wrong for you. You're right smack dab in the middle of the worst case scenario. The bad guy who wasn't supposed to get near you because of awesome "situational awareness" superpowers is near you because it turns out that situational awareness isn't a superpower that mystically repels bad guys after all...it maybe gives you a couple of seconds heads up that some bad shit is about to go down. The act of merely resisting which was supposed to make low order bad guys flee has just made this dude mad. The sight of the gun that is supposed to scare bad guys into submission obviously hasn't scared the guy enough to stop him because you're stuck trying to use the bullets it launches to force him to knock off his obnoxious behavior.

So let's tally up all the highly unlikely shit that went down with you:

After all, what are the odds I'll ever need a gun anyway?
After all, what  are the odds I'll have to do anything more than pull a gun to scare the dude off?
After all, what  are the odds that it'll take more than a shot or two to scare him away?
After all, what  are the odds that my gun won't work right?
After all, what are the odds that the bad guy will stick around long enough to empty his gun at me when I'm shooting at him?

Well, for you the forecast was a 100% chance of shitstorm. Not because you fucked up...but because unbeknownst to you, there was some violent scumsucker out there who had researched and targeted you and your friends. Just going about your life you ended up on the radar of a violent predator looking for a meal.

Lots of people argue your experience is a freak occurrence like being struck by lightning. When I look at how many violent criminals we lock up and how many more we release on the streets because we don't have enough fucking prison space to lock them all up, I'm not so sure that the dude who shot you was some sort of rare breed of super criminal that emerges on rare occasion from the mist. I'm pretty sure that we have a surplus of violent motherfuckers who would kill you without a second thought because that's just how they roll. Then I look at a place like Memphis where Tom Givens has had over sixty regular joe students that have had to plug some scumbag and I start to think that the reason more bad guys don't end up getting shot is because most of their victims don't have ready access to a firearm or the mindset to use it without hesitation when the time comes. His students seem to take having access to a good firearm seriously and given that a lot of them have been victims before showing up to one of his classes it's not shocking that they're pretty well dedicated to not being one again. Tom does a good job of showing everybody what sort of animals these dudes are and that seems to help them be willing to unleash some hollowpoints if they find themselves confronted by a scumbag. End result? Lots of bad guys with holes in them and the good guys go home at night.

I don't think you're just extremely unlucky in that you encountered a special breed of bad guy. It seems to me that you were deliberately targeted by the kind of bad guy who isn't dissuaded from a murderous path by anything short of bullets in his vital organs...the kind of bad guy people are most likely to have to shoot.

...and that's the point: You didn't get to pick what kind of bad guy you were going to face. You didn't get to pick what mindset he had when he rolled up on you with that revolver. You didn't get to pick what he was armed with. You didn't even get to pick the moment when things went kinetic. You were backed into a corner by a criminal ambush and had to react. I don't think that makes you the exception...I think that makes you the rule. This didn't go down according to your script...it went down according to his. That's an advantage that bad guys typically have over good guys. They are the only one who leaves the house knowing what they're about to pull. As a good guy you're stuck trying to react to it.

People ignore your story at their own peril. As I've said before...there are tons of lessons to be learned from your experience for those who are smart enough to listen. You've done everyone a tremendous service in sharing it.



I'm dumber than a bag of hammers...but occasionally I manage to listen to people who are smarter than me.

Example: There is a fellow out there by the name of William Aprill who has spent his adult life studying criminals as a psychologist. In one of his lectures I attended, he related that criminals have been surveyed on various things including why they commit violent crimes. One of the top responses for why they commit a violent act was a "feeling of accomplishment."

Now that's abstract, so let me anchor it in reality: Stop for a moment and think about how you felt when you graduated high school...or graduated college...or got that promotion...or bought your first house...or finished that difficult project. Something difficult that took you time and effort and that challenged your abilities, the completion of which signaled to you achievement of a goal or attainment of a status you'd been hoping for over an extended period of time. Do you have that feeling in mind? Good.

That's how a bad guy feels when he bashes somebody's skull in with a fucking shovel.

Now I ask you, good people of ARFCOM: Is that the sort of guy you want to face with a .22?