How would you have handled this one

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http://xfinity.comcast.net/articles/news-national/20131001/US--Bikers-SUV.Assault/
Being chased by 20 to 30 Bikers, out for blood? Just curious to see what your reactions or decisions would have been.
Family in car, assume you are armed with your carry gun. I also must assume one of the passengers had a cell phone, and you are in a heavily populated area, but traffic is going by you and no one really pays attention to what is going on to others.
Should he have stopped if he was armed, plowed into them, what would have been the best course of action, he had a all wheel drive SUV. Why he didn't call police, "or perhaps he did" I don't know from the article.
He was up on 125th street, which used to be a bad neighborhood, now it's considered uptown, instead of Harlem. Still pretty bad place to pull over.
 
Without having a chance to read the article just yet, the most obvious answer is floor it to the closest police station. Few "out for blood" types will chase you into the cop shop.
 
It's a tough situation.

If you are armed, and stop, there's a very good chance that at least some of the bikers are armed. You'd be in a standing gunfight, outnumbered and outgunned.

He tried to evade them, but got stalled in traffic.
 
Call the police as soons as your in a fender bender, no matter the circumstances. Seems like that would have solved part of it. Take video with phone, flee if possible, take aim and fire if vehicle is opened.

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I watched the video this morning and it made the bikers look like biker thugs. Could be. Could also have been the suv driver was antagonizing them and started the whole thing. We don't know where this started based on the story or video as the video shows a work in progress. Provided the suv family simply accidentally bumped a biker, this was ridiculous and warranted an armed response due to him being outnumbered. Me? Damned straight, I'd come out shooting, as in the video there was no other escape. I've been in a much lower geared road rage scenario and feel I'm here now due to drawing to low ready and scaring the BG away. I was ready to take it to whatever level was needed and fortunately, low/ready was all that was required at the time.
 
I wasn't aware that if you start a fight you got a free ride on self defense.
I understand hit and run to be pretty strait forward, so what is it called when you knock some one down then decide to run over them and have an escape?
wash and repeat.
Why isn't this story being told from the beginning as it was yesterday?
0 right, ratings.
robert
 
If I was cornered by all those bikers, with my wife and 2 year old in the car, you bet your backside I'd drive right the hell over them to get out.

And if they pursued, the guy with the helmet that smashed the window would have been the first to get incapacitated by a lead pill.
 
The whole deal has me a bit befuddled. According to the article, the Ranger Rover bumped into a bike and they both moved to the side of the road to deal with it. At that point, the real problem began as the vehicle was swarmed by a pack of bikers who started to damage his vehicle. The Ranger Rover fled from the scene and in the process hit some bikes and probably broke the one guys's legs in the process.

This was a life threatening situation.

When the bikers chased the Range Rover down, that is when his life was truly threatened and potentially justified use of deadly force in self defense.

I don't know what I would have done unless I was there and am not going to second guess law enforcement on this one.... no charges were filed against the Range Rover driver at this point as I understand it.

If this happened in my area, I suspect someone would have been shot. Sounds like a darn good reason to carry a reload.

An important detail that is missing is the intial contact issue.
 
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I'd come out shooting
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Not me.

Granted he eventually was stuck in traffic to the point he couldn't easily move forward, but I would stay in that vehicle. That vehicle looked capable of running over multiple bikes (and had run over one earlier, in the vid, and reportedly run over a rider earlier). I think I could turn that vehicle around in that wide of a road, or at least keep moving back and forth enough to keep a bubble around me and stall until the cops arrived.

Assuming she didn't have her own gun, I'd instruct the wife to hop in back, get the kid down on the floor, and cover the kid's ears. Probably move the carseat to the floor and drag a blanket over the wife and the kid for sound/broken glass protection.

The windows are already broken, no harm in me remaining encased in the vehicle and using the vehicle as a weapon in addition to my gun. I'd yell out that the cops were on the way, and make it clear that they weren't going to damage me quickly. Many of them would decide it wasn't worth still being there when the cops showed up. Once the first few start to run, they may all panic and disperse.
 
Call the cops number one. Stay in the SUV number two. Just like he had to use the SUV to run through 2 of the bikers to begin with, the SUV was his best weapon/line of defense. If he had to he could have just plowed right through all 30 of them. Never leave the vehicle in that situation.
 
There are a lot of moving parts to this situation and I'm sure more info will be filtering out as it usually does. I'd have to agree with HankR keep the family out of harms way the best you can and use the vehicle as the primary deterrent.

We already know this is NYC so if you have a gun legally then you are in a very small minority and if you pull it at use you are in for a crap storm, it's not right but it's the way it is today.

Another article I read on this said that the bikers had slashed the tires which slowed the vehicle. The most interesting item in the article for me was
"After the driver and motorcyclist pulled over, they were quickly surrounded by 20 to 30 bikers who began damaging the victim's Range Rover, police said."

You get in an accident, you pull over to check on the person, exchange insurance, basically try to do the right things and a mob starts attacking you and your vehicle. Makes me glad I don't live in NYC and I thought Philly was bad.
 
It looks like he would have been better off staying on a main Hwy. I would want to keep moving regardless of any traffic laws.
 
RUN...FLAT...TIRES

I've watched these various videos a couple of times now. Truly frightening, if you are the innocent family inside the car. From what I read, the SUV got in an accident with 1 biker. The SUV pulled over. It was quickly surrounded by dozens of bikers, who began threatening, and then slashed the SUV tires. The driver then tried escaping the situation and was forced to run over a couple of bikes, and unfortunately, 2 bikers. The flat tires then forced the SUV to a stop, which then led to the driver being pulled from the SUV and savagely beaten.

I just bought a car that comes standard with run-flats, and after watching this video, I'm glad I have them. Escaping and evading trouble can sometimes depend entirely on your escape equipment.
 
When he was first surrounded and decided to flee, he should have pulled out slowly..... use the vehicle to push them out of the way rather than gunning it and hitting them. He also never should have stopped moving; if the way forward is blocked, reverse.... but keep moving until you are at the cop shop.
 
freyasman said:
When he was first surrounded and decided to flee, he should have pulled out slowly..... use the vehicle to push them out of the way rather than gunning it and hitting them. He also never should have stopped moving; if the way forward is blocked, reverse.... but keep moving until you are at the cop shop.
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Regardless it still would've been considered "hitting" them, pushing or otherwise.

If you read the articles he was trying to continue to get away, but got stuck in classic Manhattan traffic, he couldn't have made it to a "cop shop" even if he wanted to.
 
But you can't assume you're armed because the actual story was in New York City. Being armed isn't an option. That changes everything. The driver of the SUV was much more helpless than someone who can be armed. I don't know if he did right or wrong, but being armed in a situation where it is illegal is fantasy and completely changes the dynamic.
 
As usual, all the facts don't appear to be in on this one, yet. The article at http://www.lohud.com/article/201310...torcyclists-pursuit-SUV-caught-video-cops-say does provide more details.

I've seen reports of other instances of conflict between motorists and groups of motorcyclists in the recent past. And have seen in person a couple of groups of motorcyclists doing dangerous stunts on multilane highways recently, in one instance having a 'pod' of motorcyclists cut sharply in front of us at an interstate exit. I don't think such things are necessarily deliberately provocative, but they are certainly unsafe as well as inconsiderate.

Deliberate attacks on vehicles and occupants with potentially lethal weapons goes beyond being inconsiderate however... and in a similar situation as described in the article linked above, I'd call 9-1-1 as soon as possible and as long as my vehicle was capable of driving, I'd not stop until LEOs arrived. If forced to stop by traffic etc. and attacked at that point ... well ... the LEOs will probably have more paperwork to do when they get there.
 
When you move the vehicle forward slowly but steadily, it forces them back, and it also allows them to move out of the way. If you gun it and hit them, it is much more of an aggressive action and it will only escalate an already bad situation. It also makes it much more likely that the you will damage your own vehicle and become trapped as a result. Stay calm, look straight ahead, and drive away at a controlled pace..... you can gun it when you clear the crowd. If they follow, lead them to the cop shop, and if they try to box you in, well you're in an SUV..... drive over them.
 
freyasman said:
When you move the vehicle forward slowly but steadily, it forces them back, and it also allows them to move out of the way. If you gun it and hit them, it is much more of an aggressive action and it will only escalate an already bad situation. It also makes it much more likely that the you will damage your own vehicle and become trapped as a result.
Click to expand...

You're assuming a lot.

freyasman said:
...if they try to box you in, well you're in an SUV..... drive over them.
Click to expand...

That's exactly what happened.
 
Yeah, maybe so... but nobody is obligated to take my advice. If you don't want to try it, then don't....
 
The Bike pulled in front of the SUV, the whole time he was cutting him off he had his head turned to observe the SUV.
I can only think the poor guy in the Range Rover was distracted as he was surrounded on all three sides and hit sensory overload. Hitting the first bike in front of him may have not been intentional, the resulting fracas is what caused him to intentionally plow over the rest in my opinion.
If his intent was to hurt them, he certainly had multiple chances while trying to escape. In the end it certainly didn't work out for anyone.
This is a prime example of stupid people, doing stupid things in large numbers. If you ride a motorcycle and don't understand what a 5000 pound Range Rover is going to do to you and your 375 lb motorcycle....
Either learn the Physics or some First Aid, it wont be nice.
 
The driver of the SUV did quite well under pressure. I doubt he had serious driving training to go on. He should've locked his doors though.

One time I was rear-ended and forced into the car in front of me. Before I could get out, the guy in front of me was out and agitated and screaming. I stayed in my car - with my left hand dialing 911 and my right hand holding my PPK while the guy pounded on my window screaming obscenities and racial slurs. The guy who hit me finally got the guy away right when the cops showed up. I had decided if the window broke, I would shoot. I'm glad the window held.

It's really a crap shoot with road rage. More so with groups of people like this story in the OP. Sometimes the best you can do is run. Or hole up and wait to die if the cops aren't fast.
 
I've finally found a legitimate reason to install a multidirectional sound cannon on the undercarriage of each of my vehicles. Also a James Bond-like multicannister tear gas dispenser. The only problem is making the vehicle air seals really tight (one vehicle is made in U.S., the other in Japan, guess who would win that contest?) and shock-proof. It can be very problematic if a vehicle in front of you wants to slow down and "make" you stop. If it is an automobile they can get your air bags to deploy and then you are in deep doo-doo. Motorcycle, well that can be a nasty bump to drive over. (Apologies to all legit riders, I'm only kidding)
 
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