The folks at Moms Demand Action believe that Kroger is somehow a magical space where nothing bad ever happens, and ridicules anyone who thinks that they should be allowed to carry a concealed handgun on the premises. Time and again their fantasy has been patently disproven, but this time there’s a twist. At a Kroger in Arkansas this past Wednesday, an elderly man was being savagely beaten by seven people. One man, armed with a concealed handgun, decided to step in and try to save that man’s life. This is the true story of how a concealed handgun at Kroger saved lives.
From Ozarks First:
The 24-year-old says when he was leaving the grocery store he saw something he couldn’t ignore. “I saw seven people against one guy and I did not like those odds.”
The out numbered man was elderly so Gene felt obligated to get involved. “Throw down, step to the side, draw, then up.”
With the gun drawn the attackers turned their attention. “They kept yelling this isn’t your fight, you need to walk away you need to put the gun down,” Gene says.
“While all this was happening shoppers pulled out a weapon of their own, their cell phones, so they can take pictures and call police.”
“Some lady behind yells there’s a man with a gun to 911.”
By the time police arrived the attackers and the victim took off.
Turns out they were all related, police say the man was an uncle being assaulted by his nephew.
We asked shoppers what they would have done.
“I would have done the same thing.”
Moms Demand Action believes that the right thing to do in that situation is allow the old man to be beaten to death while waiting for the police to arrive. They believe that guns are never the solution, but in this instance a concealed firearm saved an elderly man from a potentially deadly beating and did so without firing a single shot. Firearms save lives, plain and simple. How hard is that to understand?
It was only a matter of time that Kroger’s support of Second Amendment rights and state laws pertaining to concealed carry permits would bear fruit.
A man’s life is saved and perhaps others as well.
Speaking of bearing fruit, now the elderly victim (or his family) cannot sue Kroger for the brutal assault and/or death that would have happened in the Kroger parking lot. That is going to save Kroger a LOT of money.
Can someone please explain to me how preventing assaults/deaths and their ensuing lawsuits — in other words decreasing a company’s risk exposure — is a reason to increase rather than decrease a company’s liability insurance rates?
It’s easy to understand for people with #CommonSense, not so much for those with #GunSense.
My #SpideySense says MDA will come up with some way to twist and/or avoid this event.
That can be nicely countered if the victim makes a statement of appreciation…
True, but I doubt the victim will make any statement of gratitude, public or private. The fact that the elderly victim fled the scene suggests that he was potentially culpable in the circumstances leading to the physical altercation. Plus, the attackers were family of his, and he’s probably reluctant to implicate his kin in a crime–even if they had just delivered a beating to him.
There’s a different kind of hill justice that certain families in Arkansas subscribe to. Sadly, it’s the well-intentioned armed 24 year-old who may now need to watch his back.
Exactly!
This had a okay outcome, but we should not involve ourselves when we don’t have enough information. Crap the old guy could have been a rapist and the crowd could have just subdued him. If you see something you think is a crime dial 911, watch and provide details to police. Protect yourself,you’re not the Lone Ranger.
Someone is being beat to death by 7 guys. I don’t care if the guy on the ground started it, it stops until the cops get there. They can sort it out after the fact. I will not stand by and just watch.
Agreed!
I’m with you. Nobody in their right mind would stand there and let a mob beat another person, family or not.
The man could have been dead by the time the Police got there. These who think you should just wait for the Police would soon change their mind if they were the victim.
I can not disagree more. This is why we carry. When seconds count police are only minutes away.
Amen to that.
Remember, regardless of WHY you call the police, they’re almost always going to shoot and / or kill someone. That someone just might be you. Don’t call the police unless you really, honestly want someone (though you have no control over who) to end up dead.
“Remember, regardless of WHY you call the police, they’re almost always going to shoot and / or kill someone. ”
Really? The city I live in has a population of 100,000.
About 10 murders a year. By your estimate, this city needs a new population every few years…
http://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-Lakeland-Florida.html
You’re forgetting that the “someone” who gets shot could be a family pet. Cops especially love to murder pets, because there’s no chance of them fighting back or even having a clue what’s going on.
Yes. EVERY SINGLE COP JUST LOVES TO KILL STUFF.
All of them
Undeniable.
Seriously guy, go back to licking paint.
Anyway, to the story. I wonder how, exactly, that one guy was going to try to convince the man to put his gun down.
If you are standing in front of several people and you are pointing a firearm at them, I would say there is a very good chance that the police injure you when they arrive.
Remember, when the police arrive they have no idea who are attackers and who are defenders. To suggest that there is little to no risk to the armed defender when police arrive is just plain wrong.
I don’t see any good answer to this risk other than reholstering your handgun before police arrive.
As the police arrive, put your weapon on the ground and back away with your hands up.
Publius,
It seems to me that you are so into cop bashing that you can’t comprehend a positive outcome. The cops didn’t screw up in this situation, so saying that they always do makes you sound like a loon.
I never said “always”, I said “almost always”. Unless I’m confusing you with someone with a similar name, you’re an armed thug on the government payroll, so it’s not like you’d be anything close to objective here. Every single day there are more and more stories of the thugs in blue assaulting more and more innocent people, like the one recently about the couple who called 911 because their car was stolen and their son was kidnapped – police response? Assault the mother and do nothing to look for the car or child! Another great one this week – a house alarm went off on accident and the alarm company called the police. Instead of going to the door and checking to see if everything was OK, Officer Toughguy decided to hop the back fence where he already could see there were dogs, then proceeded to murder one of the dogs in front of the homeowner.
Go ahead, be an idiot and call the thugs in blue – I’ll laugh when I read about one of our bootlickers being executed in their front lawn by their beloved police. As I’ve pointed out many times, I used to work as a contractor for one of the largest police departments in the country and I have several family members who are cops (and thus I’m around their friends who are cops as well any time there’s a family cookout) – I know first hand what utter pieces of shit the police are.
Well, like, that’s your opinion, man.
Anyways, I enjoy life and don’t feel like having your attitude bring me down. You can think I’m a “piece of shit” if that makes you feel better. Most of the people who deal with me think I’m a pretty nice guy. I just don’t have the energy or desire to be a jerk all the time, but I can do that if the situation calls for it. Heck, I’ve gone shooting with Dr. Vino on a number of occasions and we seem to enjoy ourselves.
There are certainly police that make mistakes and do a terrible job. Many just need more training. There’s not much I can do to apologize for the fact that police are more likely to shoot the wrong person by mistake than non-LEO’s. Those stories make for great headlines, so they tend to be front page news. You won’t hear stories about “Cop Wrote Speeder a Ticket and It Went Ok” or “Cop Doesn’t Shoot Dog During Routine Hit and Run Investigation.”
I wish you the best and hope your future interactions with police are more positive.
Cheers,
-Aaron
Publius, drinking bro? Off yer meds? Just saying…
Granted, it’s early yet today, but that’s the stupidest thing I’ve read today.
Almost always? Only if by “almost always” you mean less than one percent. Let’s not use #gunsense math.
I agree unjustified police shootings are happening too frequently, but they’re still a tiny fraction of the millions of arrests.
Doubt it, people don’t vigilante style gang hunt and beat rapists. At this least not people these days in America. Maybe back in the day, or in some other regions of the world they might. This generation of kids would more likley join in on a gang rape rather than vigilante attack a rapist. Even so, if they were doing it, vigilante mob justice is wrong, liberalist, and there’s nothing wrong in trying to stop it.
No, they would pull out their cell and film it, then put it up on youtube. I doubt they would even call 911.
You couldn’t be more wrong.
Thanks, Mike. Write in and comment again next time when its you on the bottom of the pile and everyone just stands around pointing cell phones at you instead of a pistol at the guys stomping your skull.
Maybe you can go home at night and see on the news where the guy you could have saved with your pistol and a decent set of balls wound up dead or seriously injured because you walked away instead. A lot of us have more integrity than that.
If your sole reason for carrying is to protect your own ass and fvck everyone else, don’t ever be surprised if you find yourself in a jamb and nobody gives a damn or lifts a finger to help.
I like that you used the phase “A lot of us have more integrity than that.” You hit on a valid point that makes all of the difference in the world. It seems that “integrity” is the missing element of most of the “anti-gun” individuals.
All of us that carry a gun, by choice or occupation, need to always keep that in mind.
Well said, Cliff.
A lot of problems here, causing several opinions. Mine is that he should have intervened with a cell phone, camera, and a loud voice, left the gun holstered unless HE was attacked. OC would be wonderful, there.
“Protection of another person being attacked with deadly force.”
This is like the textbook situation where deadly force is authorized, the triangle is complete.
Nope. Since I was a little kid, I’ve always stood up for the weak, the helpless or an old man being beaten up by seven cowardly degenerates. To me, If I didn’t try to stop such a display of savagery, it would mean I would have not an ounce of honor, fairness or sense of justice.
The victim took off? Sounds like he must have been on the shady side of the law himself.
The lady must have been a MDA moron. She calls 911 to yell there is a man with a gun.
Why the hell didn’t she say, “There are seven people beating on a old man??”
Because beating a man to death is fine, but a gun is not!
They were just some urban youths being boys! No one gets hurt in a fist fight! But that guy with the gun, he could have really hurt someone!
Or, most likely she DIDN’T see the fighting and just saw the aftermath of when the guy stopped the fight by drawing his weapon.
Leave the lady alone. If she didn’t see what was happening to the old man, and only sees a guy with a gun, she’s going to call it in as a guy pointing a gun at people. She’s also trying to help people, just with a phone, instead of a gun.
You should go look up the video of the mob beating of a Kroger employee in the parking lot of a Memphis Kroger. That stupid woman filmed for 3 minutes thinking it was funny at first before yelling for someone else “to call someone.” Don’t underestimate the dumbassery of 911 callers.
Smothers Brothers routine:
“Why did you yell FIRE! when you fell in a vat of chocolate?”
“Because nobody would have come to help if I yelled CHOCOLATE!”
As I’ve said before, people give incomplete, unreliable and incorrect information to 911 all the time. Responding police need to be aware of this so that they don’t make a tragic error. I hammer that point home to the officers I train. 911 operators and police obviously make mistakes, but witnesses make mistakes as well. Or they just report a tiny slice of the big picture.
When I get to a scene I take great pains to identity what crimes have been committed and identify the party(s) who have committed them.
This was particularly relevant in the shooting where a woman had just shot her creepy boyfriend (husband?) with a shotgun and was standing near the bloody body when police arrived. TTAG Monday morning QBers were quick to pounce on police. After all, they “knew” the woman was the defender because she had called 911.
Yet what is said to 911 can be totally incorrect. People lie to me every single working day, and also lie to 911 dispatchers.
You know what I hang my hat on in a criminal investigation? What saves me from looking like a idiot or making a bad arrest?
Evidence.
The reason to (verbally) pounce on police in that incident is they did something which I see in the news at least monthly:
Yell at somebody, then kill them dead when they turn to look at the person doing the yelling.
That’s either gross stupidity or deliberate homicide. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and call them idiotic fraidycops.
Yelling at someone. Holding a shotgun. Standing near a body in a pool of blood. If you’ve showed restraint in the same situation, then throw the first stone.
I believe the notion is that if you’ve already committed to shouting orders at an armed suspect, you should be aware that a lot of people’s first reaction will be to turn to the source of the sound to see what that is and have a plan for distinguishing between that reaction vs the reaction of them trying to attack you, instead of falling back upon “dude with weapon within X yards of me means I’m allowed to shoot them so I will.”
SHannon is racist
Come on, Dirk.
You can do better than that…
🙂
Hey Dirk, for all we know she likes BBC. Keep trucking.
You’d think there would be anti gun comments here. I’ve been waiting a long time to see some dialogue and the closest I got was mikeybnumbers.
That being said, this is GREAT news. The irony is epic.
Helluva’ family…good for saving an old man. I’m getting there.
How hard is it to understand? As long as you have jackass that have the whole “it’ll never happen to me” thoughts in their heads, it’ll be hard every single time……… What anti’s need to understand is no one wishes for the world to be half as jacked up as it is, but those are the cards we were dealt and you have to protect loved ones and remember that self preservation is paramount!
You know, of course this doesn’t count! The good guy didn’t shoot anyone dead, so nothing happened. After all, how else can they ignore the work of John Lott?
While this does illustrate the utility of CC, the problem is this is why I fear getting involved in unknown situations. If you shot one of those dirt bags odds are the uncle would either refuse to testify or testify against you.
Chains like Kroger have the parking lots on video…
Not to mention everyone in America older than 12 has a smart phone and knows how to post on YouTube.
The best and fastest reaction you will have is based on a decision you’ve already made. That’s one of the things that makes scenario training so useful. As we’ve seen here, a CCW holder can step in and force a positive outcome.
Situational awareness and calm under pressure are huge assets. Often the legitimate threat of a firearm being used stops violence without the trigger being pulled. Most states (not a lawyer but familiar with CA law) allow self defense of yourself and others. This falls into the latter category.
When in doubt, take a moment to assess the scene so that your actions are part of the solution and not the problem. If you legitimately can’t tell what’s going on (this situation seems obvious – that’s not always the case), non-intervention is the way to go.
And why would 7 people be justified in beating an old man?
Now it is up to the gun community to pass this on. The “old” media will never give us a break. Outstanding job to the CCW holder.
In the news story I saw he was repeatedly referred to as “the gunman”. Good thing they’re not trying to put a negative spin on it…
So, this guy, the guy in Atlanta… For something that “never happens”, this seems to be cropping up quite a bit recently.
It is clear that MDAs strategy in getting guns “banned” from major store chains is to cut off high profile examples where a CCL holder stops an attacker. This is their worst nightmare and takes away from their narrative, spreading their brand of lies, and spreading hoplophobia to the masses.
Attention shoppers. We need your guns in the parking area. A patron needs your help.
Thank you for shopping Kroger.
Why is the woman in the photo carrying a 1911 hammer down?
Hammer’s back, it’s one of those skeletonized jobs, hard to see it.
No its forward. Perhaps you should slap your optometrist.
I’m guessing she’s decided to carry without a round in the chamber for whatever reason. Either that or it’s a Para double action 1911 with the safety off for some reason. If it’s a loaded (round in chamber) single action with the hammer down that ain’t too smart.
Looks kind of like a Para Elite Target, with the big back sight and all.
Yes, the hammer is skeletonized.
Yes, the hammer is down.
I agree that the chamber is likely empty.
I agree that it’s a foolish way to carry.
I want to like this story. But…I’m not sold. It sounds good on the surface, but I can’t help thinking this guy’s first move should’ve been calling it in before engage, engage, engage. Even armed, going after seven guys that weren’t an imminent threat to you personally is not a great idea. I’m not sure how well I could control a situation like that, with now potential threats in front of me, bystanders all around me, etc. What about their other two buddies that stopped beating on uncle grandpa to grab a coke, who then walk back to seeing a guy draw down on their cousins/buddies/kids? What about concealed carrier “B” who then asks what’s going on and draws attention away from the 7 yoots….
It’s easier to control than you think.
.
“Whada you gonna do, shoot us all?”
.
“Nope. Just the first one. You wanna be first?”
.
This one’s a tough call. Knowing just what was knowable at the time, I’d have called the police for sure. I’m not sure how savage this “almost beat to death business” was, however. After all, the so-called victim fled before police arrived. Couldn’t have been that bad a beating if he was still able to flee. So I probably wouldn’t have drawn.
Now, knowing more after the fact, I definitely wouldn’t have drawn, but that information is impossible to incorporate at the time. There’s a family relation here, male to male. That suggests a whole lot more to the story than simply a group attacking one guy. The alleged victim himself flees, instead of awaiting the police and pressing charges. There’s definitely more to the story than a mere out of balance brawl.
Whatever the back story, I don’t care. Let them beat each other senseless, someplace else, like their own homes. In this case, I’d call the police, then shuttle my own family to safety. I’m not getting involved in their backwoods clannish beat down hoedown and risk getting shot by local Parlous Department.
Truth about guns…but no truth in this story. Moms aren’t against concealed carry. Never have been. They are against OPEN CARRY on a grocery store. Many states have weak laws allowing pretty much anybody to carry a weapon without do much as a hint of a background check.
Get your facts straight and people may take you more seriously.
Open carry, background checks, they’re the thin edge of the wedge. Once they get that, why would they stop?
When I-594 passed here in Washington, the gun control groups didn’t say “great, we’re done!” It was “let’s get more!”
“Many states have weak laws allowing pretty much anybody to carry a weapon without do much as a hint of a background check.”
You mean, just like the words “shall not be infringed” intended?
Many states have draconian, anti-2A laws that places an undue burden on law abiding citizens to own, conceal carry and open carry a firearm, which enable criminals with ill intent to commit violence against individuals that much easier.
See I can play your little game too.
Go back to the DailyKOS, the pond scum there are more to your intellectual and moral level.
. . . .and it happened at a Kroger.
MDA is unavailable for comment, as it is still choking on the staggering amount of irony involved.
This story is such total fantasy B.S. 7 People beating up an old man in the Kroger parking lot… RIGHT. That’s believable (if he was the Hillside Strangler).
This gun not obviously over reacted to a domestic dispute (a nephew and his uncle fighting/arguing)…
By the time the police arrive the people fighting have left????? Apparently that good guy with a gun was real intimidating-he couldn’t keep them there?
First, the picture in this article is quite misleading. The woman is doing open carry not concealed carry, which is a horrible tactical practice for a civilian. All they’re really doing is letting an attacker know they can do “one-stop shopping” for a new firearm.
Second, the man being assaulted was rescued by another. That’s mean the attention was on him, not the armed citizen. As a result, the armed person was able to affect a rescue.
Third, being armed does not automatically confer protection upon a person. Massad Ayoob of the Lethal Force Institute has his students practice 20 foot drills. This is to instill the important of monitoring the area around a person since most people can easily be disarmed by an attacker that gets within 20 feet of them. Within that distance, physical force, not firearms, will carry the day.
Frankly, this article only shows that armed security guards or police, who are ready to come to the defense of a citizen, are the best option. Civilians really don’t have any business doing this due to civil liability and lack of specialized training.
Both the older person and the person who assisted him, were incredibly lucky. Things could have easily gone south.
If you’re really worried about Kroger being a gun-free zone in regards to protection, lobby the store to put armed security in the store and parking lots.
That’s all very nice, but let’s talk about the mom who was shopping and her kid pulled her gun out and shot her in the back… Or the mom driving and the kid got her gun out of her purse on the back seat and shot his mom in the back. Let’s talk about how many toddlers kill themselves or others with a gun. Why not talk about why the NRA opposes legislation that would require specific locks on guns stored at home? Why does the NRA think a suspected terrorist on the no-fly list shouldn’t have to wait longer to buy an AR15 until federal authorities can fully review the information and give final approval or denial? Why does the military train soldiers extensively on assault weapons before the soldier is allowed to handle the weapon w/out constant supervision, yet a civilian can buy an AR15 (formerly used by the military) and take it home and shoot it w/out any training at all? Why does the NRA have tax-exempt status yet spend millions on political campaigns & attack ads and lobbying Congress?
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