The value of a readily accessible handgun is proven over and over again in the daily news.
Table of Contents
Another Good Samaritan
An Indiana Conservation Officer responded to a suspicious person call on a state highway in the hilly, rural southeastern corner of the state near the town of Rising Sun, just across the river from Kentucky. He soon found himself in a fight for his life with the suspect there on the roadside. Things looked grim for the officer until help arrived from an unexpected direction.
A woman in a nearby house witnessed the struggle and came running to provide assistance to the Conservation Officer. When the struggle continued despite her shouts, she produced a legally carried handgun and fired at the attacker, who was overpowering the officer in the fight. Hit once in the torso, the assailant was transported to a nearby hospital, where he died. The officer was also transported to the hospital and treated for what were described as non-life threatening injuries.
SOURCE: The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Kentucky, 2/21/17
No Love Lost
Around lunchtime on Valentine’s Day in a Baton Rouge, Louisiana subdivision, an intruder forced his way into a home and held the man, woman, and child who lived there at gunpoint, demanding money and valuables. But when the home invader was momentarily inattentive, the homeowner retrieved his own firearm.
The homeowner fired several shots, striking the intruder and sending him fleeing. The would-be robber made it a short distance out of the house before collapsing and dying from his wounds. Police identified the deceased intruder as a 19-year-old with previous convictions, including one for armed robbery. He’d been out of jail 11 days when he was shot.
SOURCE: WAFB, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, 2/14/17
Counter Jumper
The normal business of a Tuesday evening was shattered in a DeKalb County, Georgia liquor store when a masked man wearing a hoodie and brandishing a handgun vaulted the counter. As the robber fired once, the clerk pulled his own concealed handgun, and gunfire was exchanged.
The robber fired several more shots before scrambling back over the counter and heading toward the door. None of the five rounds fired by the gunman hit the clerk, but the clerk’s return fire struck the robber three times, causing him to collapse after fleeing about 50 yards across the parking lot. The masked intruder was pronounced dead of his injuries.
SOURCE: WAGA-TV, Atlanta, Georgia, 2/15/17
Early Warning System
The first clue the owner of the In and Out Mini Mart in Yakima, Washington had that this wasn’t going to be an ordinary night was when he glanced at the monitor of the outside surveillance cameras and saw two men in the parking lot tying bandanas over their faces. Moments later, the two burst into the store brandishing handguns and demanding money.
But the owner had prepared himself for this eventuality and produced a pistol of his own, a .40-caliber Smith & Wesson. Two quick shots fired in the direction of the intruders sent them scurrying back out the door and away from the gunfire. “I would do whatever it takes to protect my business, my family, and my customers,” the owner later told reporters.
SOURCE: Yakima Herald-Republic, Yakima, Washington, 2/21/17
