Nearly used my weapon tonight.

[USA1]

How would this situation have gone had he hidden the weapon behind his leg and/or started asking for change or to borrow a cell phone? Don't get me wrong, I think you did everything perfectly, but would you have had enough time had he been a sly criminal?

That's a good point.
IMO... An approaching stranger trying to gain your trust can be even more of a threat by trying to catch a person off guard and attacking when that persons defenses are down/lowered. That's why I use the technique that I learned on this forum of firmly demanding that they do not come any closer while simultaneously holding a hand up in a halting manner.

It's too bad we have to think this way but unfortunately we don't get to pick the time or place that bad things happen.

I put my hand on my pocket carry gun every time someone comes in my direction with a sad story.

So do I. I find it to be a great tactical advantage of being able to have a full grip on the gun and be ready to draw while maintaining a casual appearance.

[Medic218]

Great, post, glad you're ok and from one vet to another welcome to the forum.

[glbedd53]

You probably didn't look like an easy target, just a target. When they need some crack that bad any target will do. What the cop probably meant was that you would have saved the next victim. I'm not saying I would have done it any different than you did and I just hope I could handle it half as well.

[Bob in Big D]

I wonder if looking at the wrong end of your gun had a short term affect on the BG and made him think that he needs a gun to continue his life of crime. His next victum may suffer because you didn't shoot.

On a more possitive note you did much better than I probably would have. With my all gray hair I do look like an easy target to some of these young thugs but I refuse to be one.

[glbedd53]

That's what I was talkin about. He probably went straight to the next target. It's possible it would have been better to shoot him, good chance he won't live much longer anyway.

[03Lightningrocks]

To the OP. Nice job handling that situation. I hate to admit this but that would have been one dead homeboy if it were me in your situation. The average citizen like me is not accustomed to high stress situations like this and it is highly likely would have unloaded on that piece of garbage.

I had an officer tell me he wish I would have shot a guy who had broken into five vehicles in my neighborhood. He said he loves filling out reports concerning dead bad guys... or something of that nature. I think the cops are as frustrated as the citizens about criminals. That human waste of life will very likely make his move on someone else and that person may not be so lucky. I kind of wish you had shot him dead, to be honest. I have a son living in Houston and would take some comfort in knowing one more bad guy in the Houston area is dead. It could easily be my son facing that piece of garbage the next time. I'm with the cops on this one.... we as a society would all have been better off if you had pumped a couple rounds into that guy.

[rdcrags]

Fangs wrote:
I put my hand on my pocket carry gun every time someone comes in my direction with a sad story.
So do I. I find it to be a great tactical advantage of being able to have a full grip on the gun and be ready to draw while maintaining a casual appearance.

I do the same thing. I don't care if it is called "profiling". Interestingly, my wife would push the car door lock button if caught by a red light at a "scary" corner with people standing around. I'm sure they could hear the click and maybe resent it. I like the fact that our newer cars lock automatically as soon as you start driving.

[Excaliber]

That's what I was talkin about. He probably went straight to the next target. It's possible it would have been better to shoot him, good chance he won't live much longer anyway.

Let's think about that - better for whom?

If the intended victim had fired, his life would have been seriously disrupted, he would likely have at least some out of pocket legal expenses to deal with, and he would have faced major social impacts from what is known in some circles as the "Mark of Cain" effect. I haven't seen this discussed on this Forum, but it's an adverse reaction that some folks have to anyone who has killed another, regardless of how necessary and justified that action was. They regard that person as somehow dirty, different, not to be trusted, and potentially dangerous forever, and they emotionally isolate the individual. This can happen with spouses, relatives, and close friends as well as with strangers. It's not something to be brushed off, and it carries forward throughout life.

With the action that was actually taken in this case, the intended victim suffered neither the consequences of the attempted crime nor the consequences of killing in self defense. I can't see any case for believing that the circumstances the OP would now be in if he had pulled the trigger would be better than they are now.

The BG clearly would not be better off if the OP had fired either. I don't think that needs a whole lot of explanation.

Then there's society, which would theoretically be safer with one less bad guy in circulation to prey on victims. While no one wants more BG's creating more victims, it should be remembered that the law and most faith based religious belief systems condone deadly force when necessary to protect innocent life, but not for individuals to go beyond that and mete out punishment at their own initiative. This function is constitutionally reserved to the courts in our society, and ultimately to God.

Police officers have to come to grips with this early in their careers, and they will make scores if not hundreds of decisions guided by these principles. Non LEO citizens don't have any lesser obligations. They rapidly dive into deep legal, moral, and personal kimchee when they assume the role of judge, jury, and executioner all rolled into one.

I maintain my original position that the actions taken by the OP and the outcome are as close to ideal as we'll ever see. I also suggest that when we are confronted by evil, we act in strict accordance with the law and our faith and leave the killing part to God except when there's no other reasonable option for preserving innocent life.

[A-R]

Excaliber regularly makes excellent and highly informative posts on this forum, but his post above is one of his best.

I was a bit taken aback while reading some earlier responses basically saying the OP shoulda killed the BG. How can you say this? The OP performed superbly, better than most of us here likely would have performed. The outcome, as Excaliber has said, was as near to perfect as we're likely to see. The OP is safe from the immediate threat and also avoids most (but not all, of course - still some sleeplessness) of the emotional and legal difficulties that come with even the most clear-cut justified shootings. It is not the responsibility of the OP (nor any of us for that matter) to rid the world of one more bad guy. It is not the responsibility of the OP to save some hypothetical future victim of this bad guy.

Let me repeat this so it sinks in: Protecting society as a whole from bad guys is not our responsibility as CHL holders.

Your job as a CHL is to make it home alive with your family. Period. Anything else is just fodder.

This desire to rid the world of one more bad guy - even if just idle web forum posturing - is EXACTLY what the antis jump on to say none of us "unimportant people" are worthy of the "privilege" of carrying a gun.

What the OP did is the perfect antithesis to gun-grabbers' fear mongering, with added benefit of being the legally and morally correct course of action.

To suggest the OP had some obligation to society to shoot the BG or to play the shoulda-coulda-woulda game is unhelpful at best, IMHO.

[terryg]

Excaliber regularly makes excellent and highly informative posts on this forum, but his post above is one of his best.

Excaliber, I am stunned by the thoroughness and eloquence of that post. Like AR, I was also a bit surprised at the suggestions of 'finishing the job'. Now some hinted that the BG would likely have been shot because, individually, they would not have exhibited the same stone cold calm as the OP. That, I understand and can identify with.

I am glad you repsonded as you did, I could not have said it any better myself.

[The Annoyed Man]

Excaliber regularly makes excellent and highly informative posts on this forum, but his post above is one of his best.

...............

Let me repeat this so it sinks in: Protecting society as a whole from bad guys is not our responsibility as CHL holders.

Your job as a CHL is to make it home alive with your family. Period. Anything else is just fodder.

austinrealtor beat me to it.

Taking out the BG so that he doesn't potentially harm someone else is immoral. For all anyone knows, this BG got home, changed his underwear, and sought out a pastor to help him find his way to Jesus, after having had such a close call. Not likely, but possible. If you execute him - because that is exactly what such a reaction would be, and execution - before he gets away and maybe harms someone else, then you've done the cause of CHL and society a disservice.

XDfanatic met the threat of force with a threat of deadly force - and that turned out to be exactly the measured response called for. The law would probably have allowed him to actually use deadly force, and after considerable expense and disruption of his life, he would have prevailed. There is no doubt that he was prepared to fire if the BG had not dived out of sight as a desperate act of self-preservation. If the BG had not done so, and had xdfanatic shot him (and we assume that he couldn't miss at that distance; a dangerous assumption), then shooting would have been the called for measured response.

The BG made two sequential choices: 1) to assault xdfanatic with a tire iron; and 2) to dive out of the way when he realized that his intended victim saw his tire iron and raised him a .40 caliber bullet. For his part, xdfanatic made two sequential choices: 1) to meet the threat of force with a threat of deadly force; and 2) to not execute deadly force when the initial threat of force was removed.

That was the morally and ethically perfect resolution. It is too bad that the BG got away instead of lying down and begging for his life until the cops got there. But he didn't. Them's the breaks. Excaliber's point about the "Mark of Cain" is a true statement. I have a friend who shot a man to death when confronted suddenly and at close range by a knife-wielding assailant. He still remembers it in intimate detail. Given the alternatives, I am sure he is glad that he did what he did, and I don't know if he loses any sleep over it. But I am equally sure that he would rather the incident had never happened, and that it is a memory he would rather live without. I have asked him about it because I am interested in the clinical details from a self-education standpoint, and he has graciously been patient about it and answered my questions; but I won't be asking him any more about it because I've learned what I need to know, and I sense that he would rather not talk about it.

If I were in xdfanatic's shoes, I pray that I would handle it exactly as he did. No more, and no less.

[sjfcontrol]

TAM -- Since when is a tire-iron not a deadly weapon?

[The Annoyed Man]

TAM -- Since when is a tire-iron not a deadly weapon?

Of course you're right. It is a deadly weapon. I don't argue that point. I actually thought about that when I wrote what I did, and I considered writing "met a threat of deadly force with a threat of deadly force." I guess I was thinking in terms of degrees of deadliness, and in my pea-brain, I calculated a .40 caliber gun as a more serious threat of deadly force than a tire iron. Perhaps it isn't. That still doesn't change my main point above - which is whether or not xdfanatic did the right thing by not killing the BG. I still maintain that he acted appropriately.

[sjfcontrol]

TAM -- Since when is a tire-iron not a deadly weapon?

Of course you're right. It is a deadly weapon. I don't argue that point. I actually thought about that when I wrote what I did, and I considered writing "met a threat of deadly force with a threat of deadly force." I guess I was thinking in terms of degrees of deadliness, and in my pea-brain, I calculated a .40 caliber gun as a more serious threat of deadly force than a tire iron. Perhaps it isn't. That still doesn't change my main point above - which is whether or not xdfanatic did the right thing by not killing the BG. I still maintain that he acted appropriately.

No argument there!

[sawdust]

Did the BG deserve to die for this event? IMO, not as it developed. The immediate threat to the OP's life ended when the BG turned and ran. Does he deserve to die for past transgressions or possible future ones? We don't know that. It's only in movies, books, and on TV that the propriety or "correctness" of our(the characters') actions or non-actions can be verified. In real life, there is no going back for a re-write.

We simply cannot take life-ending/life-altering action based on what we feel the BG might do at some future point. The movie, "Minority Report", touched on this very aspect of punishment being summarily meted out on the assumption that someone was going to commit a crime sometime in the future.

A tenet that served me well in my business, but may also apply to the broader aspects of life, is: "Do as little as possible, but do as much as necessary."