When an un-named Orem, Utah man stopped a car-jacking in a grocery store parking lot, the would-be jacker attacked the good samaritan, trying to disarm him. That’s when the bad guy contracted an acute case of lead poisoning. And the finale was an abrupt ending to a very full morning for the unidentified 27-year-old suspect who has since assumed ambient temperature. “Earlier Saturday morning, police received multiple calls regarding the man who was later shot and killed. He had reportedly assaulted a woman and was driving about Orem with two passengers.” . . .

A short time later, he reportedly stole a Ford pickup from the owner’s residence. The owner gave chase in another vehicle, with Orem police attempting to chase both vehicles.

If you live comfortably ensconced within the civilian disarmament advocacy bubble, incidents like this never happen. You know — because you’re told repeatedly — that people who carry firearms are more likely to have them taken away and used against them. So yesterday’s incident, which may have saved innocent lives, doesn’t show up on your highly selective radar screen.

As a someone who works in the firearms industry (and whose sister lives near the location of the shooting) eloquently wrote about this in an email to TTAG central command this morning, this is why we carry.  [h/t PL]

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52 COMMENTS

  5. Stopping a car jacking and then shooting the prep when he attacks, good.

    Engaging in a high – speed chase, not so much.

    Two guys, and two trophies: the good guy with a gun awsrd, and the irresponsible driver award.

  6. Hey ! I object to someone denying the “un-named…man” his constitutional right to life, liberty and happiness without legal due process in a court of law. Why, engaging in self-defense is a needlessly dangerous pursuit. someone could get killed. The proper action would have been to recommend the car-jacker reconsider his job opportunities, or offer the jacker help in obtaining a job. Crime is the result of so many people having lives of order, purpose and discipline. Not fair that some who do not have those traits should be prevented from getting the necessities of life in the only way his/her skills allow.

    No, no, no….don’t bring up all those similarly situated as the car-jacker who don’t engage in “crime”. Some people just didn’t win the lottery of life.

    I mean after all, this is America people.

  7. Another fine story about the merits of carrying a defensive firearm. Pity these thieves, rapist, and thugs can’t get it through their thick skulls that there is the potential of running into someone who is armed and that someone may not be in the mood to take their s**t!

    • I think that’s one of the reasons for the lowest crime rates in fifty years, so many people in so many stayes carrying weapons. The criminal fraternity is a small one. The word gets out that their hey day of a generally disarmed populace is over.

    • Utah Concealed Firearms Permit cost, $46.00 for residents and $51.00 for non-residents.

      Choice of carry gun, variable.

      Punching the ticket of violent scum saving the state of Utah (and society at whole) huge costs,

      *PRICELESS*.

  9. One round fired, less than a car length away. I expect that fits the template of the vast majority of DGUs that actually involve shots fired. At any rate, good on him.

  10. I guess the dead guy believed all the “They’ll just take your gun away and us it on you” propaganda the anits spew,

  12. I’m curious why the article said the CCW holder ATTEMPTED to stop a carjacking? Seems like he did indeed stop it…

    • Was in the process of stopping the carjacking when the suspect attempted to take his weapon and in the process of defending himself, shot the suspect.

      Better?

  13. Question for all the big brain people.

    Giving the crime rate, how many CCW’s will it take to eradicate criminals from the country AND how long will it take?

    How many deaths will it take to change the minds of criminal behavior?

    Should CCW’s be sucessful at reducing crime, what is the reduction rate of LEO’s no longer required to patrol crime ridden neighborhoods?

    Reduction in crime leads to reducing judicial backlog. How fewer probation, district attorney’s, prosecutors & social workers are removed from the cost of government?

    What would be the the economic tax benefit returned to the community?

    • “How many deaths will it take to change the minds of criminal behavior?”

      *chortle*

      You don’t get it. They never think it will happen to them, that only happens to the stupid ones.

      (Mumble) years ago, I worked a video game – juke box route. One of the route customers was the local low security prison.

      Once I was in their recreation – TV room counting out the cash (armed jailor standing near) and ‘COPS” was on the tube.

      Let’s just say they weren’t complimentary of the arrested’s intelligence. Laughing and hooting it up as they were ‘cuffed -n- stuffed’.

      The irony was utterly lost on them.

      • Had to read it twice but finally got it.

        You nailed it, they’re behavior is wired into them.

      • There have actually been studies done, and one psychological trait that’s nearly universal among criminals is extremely short term thinking.

        Normal people might idly toy with the idea of robbing a bank, as an intellectual exercise, as an outlaw fantasy, or because they’re in rough times, and the idea of suddenly having a ton of money is appealing. We never take it any further because we also see the next steps after that, trying to get away, the guilt over causing trauma to the bank employees and customers, the paranoia over whether you’ll be caught. Any chance of serious consideration dies under the onslaught of all that reality.

        A criminal, on the other hand, never gets past step one. Whatever the motivation may be, the money, the thrill, the sense of power, that’s enough. The other considerations don’t come into play. So they go ahead and do whatever is in their heads to do. This is why laws can have only limited impact and why there’s no such thing as perfect deterrence. Some people simply can’t be deterred because you have to think at least two steps ahead for that, and that’s just too far.

        • I completely agree. Laws do not prevent criminals from committing crimes; rather they merely act to punish the guilty after the crime has been committed. The same is true of the death penalty; the fear of getting caught and facing the ultimate sanction never enters the head of the criminal. Throughout history this has been so.
          The ultimate irony is that these guys are stupid enough to believe they are too smart to get caught.

        • Sounds like potential for genetic selection there. If they would just die before they have the chance to reproduce, the traits would be removed from the gene pool.

    • “…how many CCW’s will it take to eradicate criminals from the country AND how long will it take?”

      Since it is an unfortunate fact that you will never succeed in getting rid of nanny-state politicians, the answer to your question must be : never enough.

    • Well, you have to account for the 10’s of thousands of hardened criminals flooding into the US every year from Mexico and points south. If we wanted to reduce our level of crime dramatically, there are two things that need to be done: Seal the southern border, and then go after the criminal underclass in urban areas.

      Even doing that, however, would leave a residual level of crime, because there are some people who are just born stupid. There’s nothing you can do to prevent this. Hell, we have at least one national political party that makes it their raisons d’être to cater to stupid people, give them the wealth confiscated from productive people and make it financially attractive to the congenitally stupid to breed like rabbits and produce more stupid people.

      Absent a deliberate policy of making stupidity a disqualifying condition for being allowed to live (which wouldn’t happen, because it would eliminate most all elected politicians upon enactment), we’re going to have stupid people with us.

  14. “that people who carry firearms are more likely to have them taken away and used against them. ”

    If mine is taken from me and used against me they will have to use it as a club, because it will be empty and rather hot.

    • Reminds me of these classics:

      You may find me one day dead in a ditch somewhere. But by God, you’ll find me in a pile of brass.

      &

      I came into this world kicking and screaming while covered in someone elses blood and I have no problem with going out the same way.

  16. I don’t get it. I moved from the east coast – where I expected a high crime rate because the government endorses crime by way of restrictive gun laws – to Utah, where I can not understand how anyone would even consider any sort of interpersonal criminal act – because guns are everywhere… Maybe the car jacker was from out of state, like California. Baffling.

    • In Utah, it’s actually a bit of a training concern- you have to be aware there might be more than one good Samaritan involved in a situation. All the more reason to make sure you know as much as you can before jumping in.

  17. I’ll bet the mayor of Baltimore is a cc holder…not that she’d know how to use it…

  19. Wow, that Macey’s was literally across the street from where I lived. Orem was a great city, but that neighborhood was shadier than most. I would routinely see three or more cop cars on our street.

    Thank goodness for Utah’s gun laws.

    • Thankfully they are better than most. Not the best, but high up on the list.

  20. I’m good with that ending. I know lot’s of people carry around here(UT) and it makes me feel warm and fuzzy.

  23. I used to only carry when I thought I would be going in/near a bad area or is I would be out late. Now I carry all the time, because you just never know.

  24. NB LEO’s: One shot. Dead perp.

    Not a whole magazine. Not multiple magazines. Not multiple mags from multiple cops.

    One round.

    See, it can be done.

  26. Heard about this on NPR with, surprisingly, no editorializing. They even threw in a line about how the police officer interviewed said he “did the right thing.”

    Hmm. Paradoxical, since carrying a firearm is NEVER the right thing.

  28. People who carry concealed should be given a stipend for the positive externalities that are contributed to society!!!

  29. Small world. Used to live a couple blocks down and a few blocks over from that Macey’s. This is why I wanted to learn the martial art of the gun you see. This crap doesn’t go down often, but when it does I’d rather be prepared.

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