Crossland's weapon turned out to be a pellet gun that resembled a .45-caliber handgun, police said. The victim had a real .45 in his waistband.
Reminds me a bit of the scene from "Snatch."
Bullet Tooth Tony: "And the fact that you've got "Replica" written down the side of your gun..." [Zoom in on the side of Sol's gun, which indeed has "REPLICA" etched on the side; zoom out, as they sneak peeks at the sides of their guns]
Bullet Tooth Tony: ...and the fact that I've got "Desert Eagle point five O"... [Withdraws his gun and puts it on the table]
Bullet Tooth Tony: ...written down the side of mine..."
KBCraig wrote:Re: the shooter's marksmanship, I suspect he was walking his dog at heel (on the left side), and fired one-handed (what his his left hand being busy with a leash).
The shooter was in the right. He was under a great deal of sudden stress. I'm not going to second-guess him.
Kevin
Hopefully this guy was doing some serious shooting and scooting one handed.
The next time you practice, try it yourself. Set a target up ~15-25 ft away and imagine a gun pointed in your direction. Now get off the X as fast as you can while shooting one handed. It's not that easy...
Don't want to beat a dead horse but I will anyway...
The thing everyone has to understand about marksmanship is the situation at the time you're shooting. You can go to the range to practice and become very good but most people just go to the range and shoot paper in a calm, collected environment. In my years of training/teaching, I have tried to place my people in stressful situations to see how they act and to show them how important it is to practice the fundamentals when shooting on the range. Drills in stressful situations are the only ways for anyone to get better "moment". There are all kind of documented shootings where both BG's and LEO's fired multiple shots at each other and didn't hit anything. That's sad but it happens.
I'm not excusing this guys misses but it is important to realize that people miss when adrenaline and stress are added in any situation. I have had to listen to plenty of people who could "tell me what they would do in a given situation" but couldn't perform at all when put to ant test in a training environment. Those people obviously didn't make the team. On the other hand, I have had those that "did something" but needed help getting better. We practiced and they got better.
To close this rant, we will never shoot better than you do at the range, hitting targets in a relaxed, controlled environment. Practicing the fundamentals will definitely engrain muscle memory to assist us in aiming/trigger pull/etc., but we have to take into account the situation/human element before we start putting someone down for missing in a personal defense situation.
Adversity doesn't build character....it reveals it.
USAF (Retired)
NRA Life Member
NRA Basic Pistol/Rifle/Shotgun Instructor
NRA Range Safety Officer
Granted that accuracy may well suffer under circumstances shuch as these, this makes me rethink somewhat the equation between a 6 +1 .45 as opposed to a 15 +1 9mm, especially since a magazine swap would be a very iffy thing right now as my weak side arm is in a cast! Gives a whole new meaning to 'weak side'! Not only that but MY accuracy will definatley be lessened by the necesity of one handed shooting.
MTICop wrote:Don't want to beat a dead horse but I will anyway...
The thing everyone has to understand about marksmanship is the situation at the time you're shooting. You can go to the range to practice and become very good but most people just go to the range and shoot paper in a calm, collected environment. In my years of training/teaching, I have tried to place my people in stressful situations to see how they act and to show them how important it is to practice the fundamentals when shooting on the range. Drills in stressful situations are the only ways for anyone to get better "moment". There are all kind of documented shootings where both BG's and LEO's fired multiple shots at each other and didn't hit anything. That's sad but it happens.
I'm not excusing this guys misses but it is important to realize that people miss when adrenaline and stress are added in any situation. I have had to listen to plenty of people who could "tell me what they would do in a given situation" but couldn't perform at all when put to ant test in a training environment. Those people obviously didn't make the team. On the other hand, I have had those that "did something" but needed help getting better. We practiced and they got better.
To close this rant, we will never shoot better than you do at the range, hitting targets in a relaxed, controlled environment. Practicing the fundamentals will definitely engrain muscle memory to assist us in aiming/trigger pull/etc., but we have to take into account the situation/human element before we start putting someone down for missing in a personal defense situation.
MTI, I've said this very same thing on other threads.
Don't Lose Your Head , Your Brains Are In It !!
At my age the only thing thats getting better is my FORGETTER.
