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Purplehood wrote:I do challenge them (and have). I am playing the devils advocate here.

Purplehood wrote:

Excaliber wrote:

RoyGBiv wrote:

Excaliber wrote:

RoyGBiv wrote:In early July I was in Winston Salem, NC. Long story short, I was downtown, on Saturday evening (before sunset) and was nearly out of gas. Below "E" on the rental car. No excuse. I should have known better.

I pull into a gas station right near my highway entrance and start pumping gas. It's a typical inner city area. 4 other cars in the station, 2 at pumps and 2 at the convenience store. I'm busy watching around the station, my back is to the car. After about a half tank I spot two guys to my left, across the street, looking at me and taking to each other. Maybe 50 yards away.

The two guys start walking towards me. I stopped pumping gas, hung up the hose and closed my gas cap. Relaxed attitude, but not wasting time, less than 10 seconds. The two guys split up. One walked over behind the pump I was using and the other was headed straight for me. I turned my strong side to the car. The guy walks between me and the pump (Imagine yourself standing at the gas pump. How much room is there between you, your car and the pump? Would you ever think about waking between someone else's car and the pump? ) stops just past me and just looks at me. I stared back and could feel my heart pumping. The guy says "Hey Man"... I said "How's it goin'?" He took maybe a 1 second pause and as he walked on I got in my car and drove away.

I guess they were just trying to have some fun with me.
Thankfully, NC and TX are reciprocal states.

Lesson 1: Never drive with less than a 1/4 tank of gas.
Lesson 2: Always carry.

Consider lesson 3: Challenge and move if necessary before letting someone get within bad breath range where your options are severely limited if his intentions aren't good.

I've thought about this "lesson 3" a lot since it happened.
A potential aggressor is approaching, but I have no idea how things will unfold.
Am I about to become the target of a robbery or violence?
How do I act to dissuade the potential aggressor without "appearing like I'm looking to escalate" or "giving the aggressor reason to escalate"?

Here's what went through my head at the time....

I'm armed, witnesses around, daylight, in the open.
I can fight, I can run, I can stand my ground and prepare. But, if I begin to take obvious action to avoid some confrontation, the situation is more likely to escalate. If the potential aggressor is just "feeling me out", any obvious avoidance or aggressive action on my part will give him an immediate reason to go to the next step.... Like a child, but more dangerous. My immediate reaction was to button up the gas situation and prepare to leave the area, but, maybe the live gas pump could have been a good weapon if needed? Too much downside there I thought...

If he was intending to just have some fun and "scare the white guy", as I suspect was the case, in hindsight.... Then if I would move away from the car, or put my hands up defensively, or call him out verbally or some combination of available options, his reaction, on his turf, would almost certainly have been to "escalate the fun".... Maybe call his friend over for support.

If he was intending felony, I was ready. 6 protected, weapon ready with strong side away from the aggressor, escape routes available (I would have moved towards the convenience store).....

My gut said be ready but don't act. Turned out ok, but I think about how it could have gone otherwise.

Is taking a more aggressive response to this situation a better deterrent?...... I just didn't think so at the time.
Given the setting, I had a clear feeling that he was feeling me out, but I was ready if I was wrong.
When I looked into his eyes and didn't cower, his fun was over.

I'm certainly open to suggestions.... How else to learn?

Thanks.

During the entire approach phase, BG's are watching you closely to figure out if you'll be a good (compliant) victim or not. They capitalize on the reluctance most folks have to recognizing a threat and taking direct action to close the distance to a point where the victim is in a very poor position to resist.

Most will break off with either direct eye contact combined with a ready posture at distance, or a verbal / hand signal challenge at around 30 feet (e.g., "I don't know you. Stop there and state your business") when eye contact doesn't work. If they don't heed a direct challenge, this gives you good reason to believe that a threat is developing while there is still time to take evasive or defensive action, and it sets the stage in the minds of witnesses for who might be the good guy and the bad guy if things develop further. If the "stop" hand signal gesture is used, it also provides visual evidence that you attempted to avoid a confrontation by preserving distance and the BG persisted in closing with you, giving you good reason to believe he presented a threat. This may well be a point in your favor if direct action needs to be taken. Direct action also isn't the only option. Buttoning up the car and walking into the store may also be a viable option to avoid a direct confrontation, and removes you from the setting a potential attacker saw as favorable to him, but this decision has to be made early enough to make it practical.

Don't feel too safe just because you're armed. If you let him get within arms reach, being armed is not nearly the advantage it is further out. Even an unarmed street thug can attack and kill or disable a person before the defender could draw and fire, and gunfights at bad breath distance often don't have any winners - only degrees of losers.

I agree in general, but the problem I see with this whole situation is defining what it is that made you fear for your life/safety. Just because a guy violates your personal space while apparently unarmed and continues past you, does not justify in and of itself any form of reprisal or defensive action against him.

Especially if you are in a neighborhood where you might be perceived as the outsider and witnesses may support the assertion that the guys were just walking by you.

The ONLY option I see (and forgive me if I have overlooked your having already covered it), is to retreat prior to the distance being closed. Standing your ground against a possible perceived threat that demonstrates no overt signs of that threat seems like a losing proposition from a Grand Jury point-of-view.

The idea of CHALLENGING an oncoming individual can also be perceived as a simple act of provocation. Of course simply moving from your existing position to another more defensible one and then challenging when the individual changes his course to continue coming straight at you, would in my book, be considered a good course of action.

RoyGBiv wrote:

Excaliber wrote:

RoyGBiv wrote:In early July I was in Winston Salem, NC. Long story short, I was downtown, on Saturday evening (before sunset) and was nearly out of gas. Below "E" on the rental car. No excuse. I should have known better.

I pull into a gas station right near my highway entrance and start pumping gas. It's a typical inner city area. 4 other cars in the station, 2 at pumps and 2 at the convenience store. I'm busy watching around the station, my back is to the car. After about a half tank I spot two guys to my left, across the street, looking at me and taking to each other. Maybe 50 yards away.

The two guys start walking towards me. I stopped pumping gas, hung up the hose and closed my gas cap. Relaxed attitude, but not wasting time, less than 10 seconds. The two guys split up. One walked over behind the pump I was using and the other was headed straight for me. I turned my strong side to the car. The guy walks between me and the pump (Imagine yourself standing at the gas pump. How much room is there between you, your car and the pump? Would you ever think about waking between someone else's car and the pump? ) stops just past me and just looks at me. I stared back and could feel my heart pumping. The guy says "Hey Man"... I said "How's it goin'?" He took maybe a 1 second pause and as he walked on I got in my car and drove away.

I guess they were just trying to have some fun with me.
Thankfully, NC and TX are reciprocal states.

Lesson 1: Never drive with less than a 1/4 tank of gas.
Lesson 2: Always carry.

Consider lesson 3: Challenge and move if necessary before letting someone get within bad breath range where your options are severely limited if his intentions aren't good.

I've thought about this "lesson 3" a lot since it happened.
A potential aggressor is approaching, but I have no idea how things will unfold.
Am I about to become the target of a robbery or violence?
How do I act to dissuade the potential aggressor without "appearing like I'm looking to escalate" or "giving the aggressor reason to escalate"?

Here's what went through my head at the time....

I'm armed, witnesses around, daylight, in the open.
I can fight, I can run, I can stand my ground and prepare. But, if I begin to take obvious action to avoid some confrontation, the situation is more likely to escalate. If the potential aggressor is just "feeling me out", any obvious avoidance or aggressive action on my part will give him an immediate reason to go to the next step.... Like a child, but more dangerous. My immediate reaction was to button up the gas situation and prepare to leave the area, but, maybe the live gas pump could have been a good weapon if needed? Too much downside there I thought...

If he was intending to just have some fun and "scare the white guy", as I suspect was the case, in hindsight.... Then if I would move away from the car, or put my hands up defensively, or call him out verbally or some combination of available options, his reaction, on his turf, would almost certainly have been to "escalate the fun".... Maybe call his friend over for support.

If he was intending felony, I was ready. 6 protected, weapon ready with strong side away from the aggressor, escape routes available (I would have moved towards the convenience store).....

My gut said be ready but don't act. Turned out ok, but I think about how it could have gone otherwise.

Is taking a more aggressive response to this situation a better deterrent?...... I just didn't think so at the time.
Given the setting, I had a clear feeling that he was feeling me out, but I was ready if I was wrong.
When I looked into his eyes and didn't cower, his fun was over.

I'm certainly open to suggestions.... How else to learn?

Thanks.

RoyGBiv wrote:In early July I was in Winston Salem, NC. Long story short, I was downtown, on Saturday evening (before sunset) and was nearly out of gas. Below "E" on the rental car. No excuse. I should have known better.

I pull into a gas station right near my highway entrance and start pumping gas. It's a typical inner city area. 4 other cars in the station, 2 at pumps and 2 at the convenience store. I'm busy watching around the station, my back is to the car. After about a half tank I spot two guys to my left, across the street, looking at me and taking to each other. Maybe 50 yards away.

The two guys start walking towards me. I stopped pumping gas, hung up the hose and closed my gas cap. Relaxed attitude, but not wasting time, less than 10 seconds. The two guys split up. One walked over behind the pump I was using and the other was headed straight for me. I turned my strong side to the car. The guy walks between me and the pump (Imagine yourself standing at the gas pump. How much room is there between you, your car and the pump? Would you ever think about waking between someone else's car and the pump? ) stops just past me and just looks at me. I stared back and could feel my heart pumping. The guy says "Hey Man"... I said "How's it goin'?" He took maybe a 1 second pause and as he walked on I got in my car and drove away.

I guess they were just trying to have some fun with me.
Thankfully, NC and TX are reciprocal states.

Lesson 1: Never drive with less than a 1/4 tank of gas.
Lesson 2: Always carry.

OldCurlyWolf wrote:

LeonCarr wrote:About 6 years ago I was on my way from Beaumont to Houston to spend the weekend with my girlfriend at the time. I stopped in Baytown, roughly halfway in between, to fill up with gas because it was the cheapest place. As I paid at the pump and started to pump gas, a thuglife gangsta looking individual gets out of a beat up 1980s Lincoln Continental and offers to sell me a 35mm camera. The 35mm camera was your basic no name junk made in china type camera, so I said no thank you sir. He continued his sales pitch, and said in a very threatening manner, "You are gonna buy this camera". I then took the gas nozzle out of the fill neck and said, "You are gonna back away right now, or I am going to cover you with gasoline and set you on fire". I then used my left hand to take my Zippo lighter out of my left pocket. He ran off, jumped into the beater Lincoln, and drove off. I have a buddy with Baytown PD, and I gave him the LP from the Lincoln and a description of the camera salesman. Maybe it wasn't the textbook way to deal with the situation, but it worked. As Clint Smith from Thunder Ranch said, "If you look like food, you will be eaten."

To keep this CHL related, my right front pocket contained a Glock 26 loaded with 127grain Winchester Ranger +P+, and I had a Remington 870P loaded with 000 buckshot behind the seat. I never travel light going to Houston.

Just my .02,
LeonCarr

Crazy works over 99% of the time. NOBODY wants to mess with CRAZY.

speedsix wrote:...and they don't announce with sirens...making for an ugly surprise when they DO decide to pop up...

speedsix wrote:...not just in the rural areas, but in overworked/undermannned areas like Dallas or cities with few officers on duty at any time...the realities Excaliber's posted about make the willingness and capability to de-escalate situations and choose "battles" carefully and save our powder for a last resort (not to be mistaken for pacifism or an unwillingness to defend ourselves, but as an acknowledgement that resupply may be only a dream) all the more important...the cavalry may be much further than over the hill...and we may be standing alone far longer than we'd like to be....

Purplehood wrote:

Excaliber wrote:

Purplehood wrote:I noticed at least two posts in this thread that asked why the Police had not responded by the time that the poster had finished pumping their gas.

As a counterpoint to Speedsix's tongue in cheek reply (which did make me chuckle), the short version is that LEO's don't have any exemptions from the laws of space and time.

It takes time for a dispatcher to gather information, it takes time to transmit that information, and it takes time to get from wherever the officer was when he received the call to where he is needed. The incident in the OP's post wasn't a Code 3 (lights and sirens) call, and even running code saves only a fairly small amount of time. This is the real reason behind the saying that when you have only seconds, the police are just minutes away.

If you've ever been late for an appointment and tried to compress the time it takes to get to your destination to fit the time remaining until you're due there, you have some idea of the challenges involved.

Time and space don't compress much, even when we want them to.

I guess I failed to make my point. I really don't understand why anyone would expect a response in that short a time. Seems to be totally unrealistic to me...

Purplehood wrote:I noticed at least two posts in this thread that asked why the Police had not responded by the time that the poster had finished pumping their gas.

speedsix wrote:

G26ster wrote:

speedsix wrote:...going to the trouble to report this guy may have saved someone else a bad day...thanks for taking the time...another officer may have run into him later that day...a check may have revealed a warrant...you don't know the good you did by asking to have him checked out...

I said I was the odd man out here, but for you, as a former LEO, I guess we think different, as I did not have to be in daily contact with the dregs of the earth as you did in your career (and thank you for your service). First, the OP did not state whether the man had anything with him, like a bag with perhaps a belt in it. He did not state where the "suspect's" truck was. Was it in the Walmart parking lot? Back at the hotel? Am I to evaluate everyone I come in contact with as "suspect" if they don't meet my "personal smell test" and call 911 if they don't? Sounds like what the DHS wants us to do.

The man had no phone. Not everyone does. The OP didn't know why he needed to get back to his hotel. Neither do I, and there could be a million reasons not evident as to why. Maybe that's where his truck was. Maybe he had to be there at a specific time to meet other workers and he did not want to wait for the police to give him a ride. Maybe he got a ride from the hotel to Walmart to try and get a belt and they didn't have one to fit his truck. And yes, maybe he was a mass murderer out on the loose. Anything is possible.

I don't have a Batman License, I don't think I have a Robin license either, and I should be making a 911 emergency calls reporting everyone who I come in contact with that doesn't meet my personal smell test. Or, perhaps I just don't know what 911 is for.

Let's turn the tables a bit. Suppose the man saw where the Op's thumb was, saw a bulge, and assumed he had a gun. After being rebuffed by the OP, he goes inside and has the clerk call 911, and a MWAG call goes out on the OP. Sure, you'll beat the rap, but when you get pulled over with 4 or 5 police pointing guns at you, and after being questioned, how nice of a day have you had? After all, the man didn't know you had a CHL and were legally carrying, he just got scared and had someone call 911 because he didn't even know it's legal for anyone to carry. You didn't pass HIS smell test, and you scared him.

Again, I know I'm in the vast minority here, but I just felt there were some counterpoints to be made. Flame suit on

...no flame, but the batman/robin thing is a cheap shot..Excaliber covered it quite well...most LEOS would prefer checking something out than finding out afterward that someone hesitated...and didn't call...and a bad thing could have been averted...911 is the correct way to report a suspicious person...when you call the non-emergency numbers, they just transfer you and it confuses them...
...as to the turning tables...we can live life timidly, hoping we don't upset anyone, or we can live life...I prefer the latter...and if someone calls in on me for such as you described...I'd just say "Yeah, I'm the guy who just called in the suspicious person...so I guess he was trying to get even..."
...too often I've written the report and had someone pop up looking for their 15 minutes and say "I saw him...but I didn't want to call in and look stupid if it was nothing"....and they can't even give a good description...I'd say to always follow your gut, let the LEO sort it out...

G26ster wrote:

speedsix wrote:...going to the trouble to report this guy may have saved someone else a bad day...thanks for taking the time...another officer may have run into him later that day...a check may have revealed a warrant...you don't know the good you did by asking to have him checked out...

I said I was the odd man out here, but for you, as a former LEO, I guess we think different, as I did not have to be in daily contact with the dregs of the earth as you did in your career (and thank you for your service). First, the OP did not state whether the man had anything with him, like a bag with perhaps a belt in it. He did not state where the "suspect's" truck was. Was it in the Walmart parking lot? Back at the hotel? Am I to evaluate everyone I come in contact with as "suspect" if they don't meet my "personal smell test" and call 911 if they don't? Sounds like what the DHS wants us to do.

The man had no phone. Not everyone does. The OP didn't know why he needed to get back to his hotel. Neither do I, and there could be a million reasons not evident as to why. Maybe that's where his truck was. Maybe he had to be there at a specific time to meet other workers and he did not want to wait for the police to give him a ride. Maybe he got a ride from the hotel to Walmart to try and get a belt and they didn't have one to fit his truck. And yes, maybe he was a mass murderer out on the loose. Anything is possible.

I don't have a Batman License, I don't think I have a Robin license either, and I should be making a 911 emergency calls reporting everyone who I come in contact with that doesn't meet my personal smell test. Or, perhaps I just don't know what 911 is for.

Let's turn the tables a bit. Suppose the man saw where the Op's thumb was, saw a bulge, and assumed he had a gun. After being rebuffed by the OP, he goes inside and has the clerk call 911, and a MWAG call goes out on the OP. Sure, you'll beat the rap, but when you get pulled over with 4 or 5 police pointing guns at you, and after being questioned, how nice of a day have you had? After all, the man didn't know you had a CHL and were legally carrying, he just got scared and had someone call 911 because he didn't even know it's legal for anyone to carry. You didn't pass HIS smell test, and you scared him.

Again, I know I'm in the vast minority here, but I just felt there were some counterpoints to be made. Flame suit on

G26ster wrote:I'm afraid I'm going to be the odd man out here without more info, but what was the "emergency" that warranted a 911 call? Best I can tell, he just asked for a ride and offered to pay you.

Blindref757 wrote:I was at the local Wal-Mart this morning and had just put the nozzle in my tank when a strange man approaches me at the back of my vehicle. I was carrying and my 9 yr old boy was attending the pump. He was about 40, wearing denim shorts, a red t-shirt, and was a little dirty and unshaven. The stranger told me that he was here in Tyler working (from Dallas) and his truck threw a belt. He needed a ride to his hotel 3 miles away and offered me money to take him. I was immediately kicking myself when I patted my pocket and realized that my phone was charging inside my car and that the key was in the ignition. I told him that our PD has a service vehicle on duty during the day that helps disabled motorists and told him that I would gladly call them. He immediately backed up and declined that service...mumbling that he was frustrated because nobody would help him in this town and he again offered to pay me. I told him that money wasn't the issue...that I didn't know him was the problem. He walked away and engaged another guy pumping gas. I called 911...but in the time it took to pump $50 in gas, I didn't ever see an officer and the dude disappeared.

The whole incident didn't pass the smell test.
1. They sell a few belts inside Wal-Mart
2. Why didn't he ask me to take him to the parts store right up the street?
3. What was at his hotel that would have solved his problem?
4. Why was money so important to him.
5. Why was he not interested in help from a Tyler PD service officer?
6. Why would he be here from Dallas without a cell phone and someone to call?

I did have my thumb under my shirt and my strong side turned away from him. I was ready if things got ugly like the guy in Ohio...but I made some mistakes that I can learn from.

1. My phone should have been with me.
2. My keys should not have been in the ignition...my car fills from the passenger side (I don't like that). The guy could have easily jacked my car.
3. I should have instructed my kid into the car to get him out of harms way immediately upon being approached (if the keys weren't in the car).

Situational awareness is crucial. I've only been a CHL holder for a couple of months...so I'm not an expert by any means. This was a good learning opportunity for me and I'd have been a lot more oblivious a year ago. Thanks to the many people on this board who have helped me improve in this area. It's a fast paced world out there!