Towing Office Shootout

[flynbenny]

My apologies if this has been posted or discussed already, I did a quick search and found nothing.

It involves a shootout at a towing office in Florida. I won't ruin the suspense for y'all, go watch it please.

http://www.trutv.com/shows/most_daring/index.html
Scroll down the available videos and click on Tow Truck Shootout.

What could they have done differently? What was done wrong? And what was done right?

[USA1]

its easy to play "monday morning quarterback" but that manager was a good shot especially at that distance with the adrenaline flowing.

he may have saved the life of the cop.

[Rollin2008]

how many of us go to work expecting it to be just like any other day?? OH man that kinna stuff scares me to death. and i work in a BANK??

[ELB]

That was a very interesting video for a number of reasons, not least of which is that it pretty much caught the whole thing. Seems like most surveillance tapes catch a little part of the action, with most of it either happening off screen or so blurry it's hard to figure out what is actually happening.

Lots of lessons here too. Most notably to me, I cringed and emitted a epithet of disbelief when the narrator mentioned the pistol in a lockbox...

[dicion]

But What about what our favorite delusional friends say?

<brady bunch> Officer's won't know good guys from bad guys if citizens are carrying guns </brady bunch>

Looks like the officer had no problem identifying the manager as a 'good guy' to me...

to the manager for sure.

Also, If someone had been carrying instead of it being in a lock box, they might have been able to take him out sooner, like when he ran out of ammo, or came inside the building.
Just glad that no one got killed.

[TLE2]

Having known someone in the "tow business", I'd have had a 12g in easy reach.

Actually, I'd have a 12g in every office, in a "break glass in case of nutcase" case .

People get a little nuts when their car's been towed, so I'm surprised the company wasn't more prepared.

[Bunkins]

Wow... Yeah if I was in the towing business there would be a gun in every office, and atleast 1 person carrying..

I work in the trucking industry, and we've had more than our fair share of crazies come in. My life has been threated many times, we've had guys chase us with knifes, tire iron's, vehicles, you name it.. Everything but a gun.. I couldnt imagine being in a situation like that.

We do a lot of work after hrs, thats when things get hairy. Comes time to pay the bill, things dont always go well. The first time I experienced it I was 19, 3am and trying to collect money for a repair job.. The guy started a fight with me, my temper was enough to get him to pay up and leave. 2 weeks later he came in with another guy during working hrs and went after my dad with tire iron's. I jumped one of the guys and my dad took the tire iron away from the other and proceeded to give him a education while the office people called the cops... Ever since there is a gun in the shop office, and in the parts office.. That was not the first time it's happened, and not the last time either. I've pulled a gun on a guy one night who pulled a knife and threated to kill me while trying to collect money.. That was 3 yrs ago. We've had people come in so high on drugs they didnt even know where they were. One time we had a guy come in higher than a kite, we called the cops and pretended nothing was going on. Once the police got there they searched the trailer and it had 1K LBS of cocaine in the front. The hostile people we've ran into, almost all of them are foreigners, who think everything should be free, and they get ticked when you wont negotiate the price, so their "defense" is to scare you, threaten you or whatever else they can think of to pressure you into letting them leave without paying or giving them "good discount".. The crack heads have mostly been US citizens..

I dont know why it took me so long to get my CHL, but I'm not nearly as scared to go to work in the middle of the night anymore. Still scared, though. Get called in the middle of the night to go to work, your first thought should be about lost sleep, instead your wondering if your going to run into any trouble. A lot of guys here wonder if they will ever have to draw, it's more like when for me because I've done it twice already. Luckly thats as far as it's ever gone, hopefully it stays that way. Many of the dealerships have had similar issues, most of which now require 2 people to be at the location when working after hrs. We dont have the man power for that, so to some people we look like easy targets.

[bryang]

It would have turned out a whole lot different if the manager had his pistol on him instead of trying to get it out of a locked box with bullets flying everywhere. Nevertheless, when he did get it out, he knew how to use it and he was a pretty good shot, too!

I am glad everyone was okay and that it turned out the way it did. Many good lessons there for us all.

-geo

[Target1911]

YES....the tow service is VERY dangerous. I have drawn many times......used it once.

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/1273890.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

unfortunately most all tow companies have a very strong "No Gun" policy.

D. Hedge

[ELB]

I googled this incident to see what other details might pop up. Was interesting... to me at least...

1. There's a website forum devoted to Tow Operators. Who knew? Tow operators know, obviously, lots of them on the site. Some posts about the incident, including from some of the folks at Lake Park Towing.
http://tow411.yuku.com/topic/53891/t/Sh ... tml?page=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

An unfortunate coincidence -- the wife of one of the guys who co-owned the business (but was not there that day) died of a heart attack about a month later. She was young, only 33. That guy's mom is the other co-owner, and she was the one shot in the back and hip, and whose voice you hear on the 911 call.

2. The deputy you see in show up in the parking lot (Deputy Bedala, former NYPD officer) won an award as one of the nations "Top Cops" as determined by the National Association of Police Organizations. This was awarded a week or so ago -- John Walsh was the MC, Pres Obama made an appearance.
http://www.policeone.com/police-heroes/ ... S-winners/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

3. NONE of the stories I read about this incident mention the office manager going out and shooting at Voltz (the attacker). Most stories are re-postings/variations on the announcement about the deputy getting the award. One story mentions that the people from the towing company wished that their manager would get more recognition for his role, but the story doesn't mention what he did. One other story says a tow truck operator came into the parking lot during the battle and began shooting at Voltz (this seems completely wrong).
http://www.wptv.com/news/local/story/Lo ... x?rss=1700" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The tow operator forum thread(s) does make some mention of the manager.

4. Pretty much all the stories say Voltz was hit six times (he lived and is facing attempted murder charges http://www.pbso.org/index.cfm?/36236E2D ... /index.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;). If the video narrative in the OP is correct, that would mean three rounds from the cop, three from the office manager. Interestingly, the stories use the same language: "Voltz finally went down after the sixth shot." Not, "The officer shot him six times and he went down."

5. Also interesting is the the officer is quoted saying he fired as he was trained, “It was pretty much training: Two shots, assess; another two or three, assess,...”

6. This story has a video interview with the deputy. He never mentions the office manager with the pistol.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/ ... 9304.story" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The lack of "official" mention of the manager with the pistol is...curious.


elb

updated to correct a detail about ownership and who was present that day...