Received a Bit Of a Scare

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All of us see people like this daily at gas stations,parking lots,malls,etc.
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This kinda strikes me as very, very relevant. It goes to show that while the vast majority of people are no threat at all, some are.

Is there a solution to this, other than dropping everyone who gets within three feet of you with a figure 4 hold? I don't know, but my constant drum I bang on being realism here ... I don't know how to comment on this. Obviously it's a bad idea to let someone you haven't identified walk up on you, and you showed that even some eye contact can deter someone from snatching one's phone. But at which point does it become "tactically unsound" to go shopping ... or in this case get some gas, or go to a mall, or anything, really.

Tough scenario, for sure.
 
These kind of young punks have no idea when to back off..
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There were four of them and you have now threatened one of them with cremation, what's the range of that flame thrower anyway?

I suspect in that situation you will be surrounded and are most likely to become bar-b-que yourself.

At best you can use the distraction to get in your car and get moving but I wouldn't be surprised if you wind up having a Buick tail you all the way home. This story may not end right then and now but mayby tonight or some other day.

I'm glad it worked out as it did and all tat's wanted was to use the phone but I would definitly re-think my mode of carry after that wake-up call.

I carry a P-11 in right pants pocket and cell phone in left pocket, nothing on the belt.
 
I agree Nushif.
Since all of us have different financial circumstances that dictate a lot on where we live such as the nice suburbs or a gated community.
Myself I have owned the same home for 32 years now.
The area went from a majority anglo working class area to now an area comprised of mostly Hispanics and a great number of these have very questionable immigration status.
Point in case.
The neighbor on my left and right and directly across the street cant even speak the English language and neither can their children.
They never cause issues with me and it's a live and let live situation.
But what I am getting at is the area has declined and the rate of pay a lot of these people make and the education level is severely down compared to what it was even 10 years ago.
So as an area declines so it goes that you start getting more drop outs,drug dealers,gangs,crime,etc.
Some of us just have to make do with the hand that was dealt and just learn to live with it.
One of the most bizarre things I have heard was a lady here at work who lives in a very nice area and is pushing her husband to put the house up for sell because the neighbor several houses down from her had the home burglarized while they were in France on vacation.
Go figure.
 
What happened to the days of asking to use someones phone? or dropping 35 cents into a pay phone?
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I can't tell you the last time I actually saw a payphone.

I doubt these were the kinds of people who ask for anything. It was probably just Tattoo's way of showing off how much of a BA he was to his buddies. Could he have asked? Sure, but what would that have gotten him?
 
You know after pondering this for a couple of days along with great councils of war with some of friends I too am starting to think he was showing off to his cohorts.
The guy he snatched the phone from was driving a nice and pretty new Ford pickup and was dressed in business casual was about 45 years old,5'8" and weight around 140 pounds.
I guess he looked weak.
Dangerous people living a dangerous fool hardy life.
 
Heeler, what I was cautioning against was more of a 'Locked eye contact" or following eye contact, would easily be taken as a challenge.. I should have clarified that.. The quick glance, the "Yeah, I see you, you see me, but I have no intentions of messing with you" look.. that along with a sprinkling of confidence and your good to go.. sounds like, and with your personal outcome... obviously, ya did it right...
Trivia: or file under worthless info unless your a cop and want to catch the little darling in a lie category..
Some time back, I spoke with a SWBT repair guy, that did payphones.. he stated that they were slowly being phased out.. because everyone just about now has a cell... I know that payphones, especially in indigent areas, are still in use.. and often used as an excuse for pimps, prostitutes and drug dealers to gather.. "Hey officer, I'm waiting on a phone call.".. what they fail to realize, is because of that very thing (Dope, hoe, pimp), most payphones will not receive incoming calls.. if you take a look at them, there is no number posted on them, they are for out going calls only.. When we hear that line, the conversation is apt to take a different turn...

Airports and bus stations, different story..
 
most payphones will not receive incoming calls.. if you take a look at them, there is no number posted on them, they are for out going calls only.. When we hear that line, the conversation is apt to take a different turn...

Airports and bus stations, different story..
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Way back in the day, when pay phones were fairly common, I seem to remember pay phones having a number posted on them for incoming calls.
My uncle works for a phone company, and he told me that pay phones were being phased out because they were a money pit. Too often in need of repair, and it didn't take much other than a screwdriver to rip open the coin hopper and steal all the money inside of them. This was the second leading cause for repair, the first being the handset being ripped from the box. Cell phones obviously are a big part of their demise as well. I wonder if the pay pones that still exist will cease to be soon as well, with cell phones being part of the welfare entitlement. :rolleyes:
 
Just a suggestion...

Since so many "problems" occur at gas stations, I've found a way to avoid them almost entirely.

I fill up on a weekday morning on my way to work. Scumbags don't tend to get up and out early. For whatever reason, it seems most people think that waiting until after work on Friday or sometime on weekend evenings are THE time to fill up. I see cars lined up behind each other during those times, waiting to get to the pumps.

I never wait.

7:30 am > 7:30 pm :)
 
These stores/fuel stations around here have multi pump stations which can be used by different vehicles on either side of the pump.
This particular place has eight pumps so essentially sixteen pumps to pull up to.
I never wait in line for gas.
And since I have to be at work by 6:00 a.m. I get gas usually around 4:30 p.m.
Since my daily work econo car gets 35-37 mpg I only have to get gas every eight working days on average as I dont use my little Nissan work Burro on weekends.
 
skoro said:
Since so many "problems" occur at gas stations, I've found a way to avoid them almost entirely.

I fill up on a weekday morning on my way to work. Scumbags don't tend to get up and out early. For whatever reason, it seems most people think that waiting until after work on Friday or sometime on weekend evenings are THE time to fill up. I see cars lined up behind each other during those times, waiting to get to the pumps.

I never wait.

7:30 am > 7:30 pm :)
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Best advise yet.....

In regard to gas station incidents, my current business partner, who drives nice late model performance cars, is always running around with a bad case of "HUA' (head up anatomy). When we leave the office, I always have to wait on him, as he will mess around at his car for 5 minutes or more, and our business is located in a less than favorable part o town, and we are in a cash business, We always have more on us that most folks would deem sane.. In other words, he is a target... and having always been a civilian, never having had to wade through the mud, the blood and the beer.. is is hard to drive points home to him... He just don't get it....

One night he pulls up to a gas station, in a very unsavory part of town, a location where most would have kept going because there WERE 8 or 10 bangers hanging around. He said he stopped because he had just left a steak house, and his low fuel light came on... Well low an behold, two of the guys approach him, attempt to trap him from both directions, with nowhere to go. Car and pumps blocking two routes of escape, he is on the passenger side of the vehicle... Fortunately for him, I had put a set of lazer grips on a J frame that he had in his pocket.. the dot on the forehead tended to explain his point of view about the matter... they backed away, others started to move in his direction.. he dropped the nozzle, (leaving about $30 credit on the pump) and jumped in and drove off... There was an in-depth conversation with him the next day at he office when he relayed to story to me.... he says he now gets it... But we still have to wait on him to jack around at his car in the evening...I don't think he really did get it..
 
But we still have to wait on him to jack around at his car in the evening...I don't think he really did get it..
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Cop Bob,

Yeah...he probably didn't "get it", but at least he understood when he was being stalked and knew what to do - and that's something a lot of people never quite recognize nor have the ability to deal with. Also, he was very smart about getting the hell out of there once he had made his point.
 
The first thought that occurred to me is the same one I have when I hear about women using their purse for carry. Why put your weapon in something that is such a primary focus of criminals? A Blackberry is an easy grab for a petty criminal and I don't want to be wrestling over a gun with anyone.
 
True nuff Kodiak.
But just know that these guys absolutely know they might score when some guy comes wadding thru in open carry mode with some $700.00 pistol strapped on their side.
It's all pretty relative really.
 
Living in a town of 3000 people, I seldom find myself in these types of situations. I always fuel up before leaving town and avoid stopping at any business in areas I'm unfamiliar with. I'm glad you came away from this one OK. I'd like to be able to say just how I would have handled things but I can't. All of my friends and family tell me I have a very intimidating "look" and people I've met have later said I was "scary". IF this is true it would not be something that would work in my favor in this kind of scenario. It would more likely escalate the problem, especially with the kind of people you dealt with here. I don't avoid direct eye contact but I don't hold it too long either. I moved out of Kansas City in 1984 because I thought things were getting bad then. I made the decision not to OC when neccessity demands that I go to these areas because I believe with the mentality of people like the ones you dealt with, this may be seen as a challenge and they may want to prove something to their friends. I may be very wrong here, I honestly don't know. I'm often tempted to OC anyway.
 
Condition yellow is a good place to live. Sounds like you went to orange when the car with the four arrived.
 
In all honesty I have been a tad jumpy since that day last week and yesterday was kind of another strange gas station day.
We have a big grocery store chain that gives points of .10 off a gallon of gas at local Shell fuel stations.
So I decided to use it for the first time yesterday.
This was a different store/gas station and about a mile from the last weeks place of excitement.
While pumping gas a car pulled up on the same pump but other side.
A woman was driving and I could here her young boy in the backseat talking to her and upon glancing over I see her man get out of the passenger seat to start pumping the gas.
Well he starts and then for reasons I can't fully understand he all of sudden appears around the opposite side of the pump between my little car and the pump.
I had an immediate startle and instinctivly reached for my right pocket where my .380 was sitting in it's RKBA pocket holster.
WTH!!
He realizes he's startled me(better put,scared the excrement nearly out of me)and then proceeds to turn and walks away towards the front of my car and then around it.
As he's near the opposite rear quarter panel he looks at me and mouths out "Do'in O.K. man"..."Yea man" was my reply.
He then walks past and back to the car he was pumping gas for with me staring at his every move the whole time.
What that was all about he only knows.
I truely dont think his intentions were bad but this guy is out of his mind pulling a stunt like that.
Is the moon in the wrong phase are something???
 
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Cop Bob said:
There was an in-depth conversation with him the next day at he office when he relayed to story to me.... he says he now gets it... But we still have to wait on him to jack around at his car in the evening...I don't think he really did get it..
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Doesn't sound like he got it beyond maybe, "lasers are cool!" :rolleyes:

The herd mentality is way too strong for some folks to ever overcome it.
 
I had already used my credit card on the pump and was getting gas and I finished that up and started walking to go inside when I made eye contact with the tattooed guy who was standing next to the Buick.
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You had already payed for the fuel at the pump, and you had already identified a potential threat....is a few scratch off lottery tickets really worth it?

I would have got back in my car and went somewhere else for the lottery tickets.
 
I'm actually very surprised the guy gave the phone back. Thats an odd one.
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I'm not. It speaks to his bravado, showing off to his buddies. He's basically saying "I can do whatever I want. I don't even need this but I took it anyway." giving it back was a slap in the face, and made him look even more BA in the eyes of his cohorts.
 
EasyG,there are people like this all over Houston.
The loud rap music was just that and is a constant irritant blasted out by these young guys.
I did not give that a second thought as it's so common.
The guys piling out of that pos Buick was no threat.
The only time I really became alarmed was when the guy snatched the phone from the other guy.
Again,except for the first look that made me feel he "made" my carry by glancing at what he probably really thought was a phone,as his bad behaviour clearly indicated minutes later.
I am not going to live in a cave and I stop at that store quite often as it's right outside my neighborhood.
Frankly I would not have let a guy like that get within punching range of me anyway.
The reality is there are a lot of bad guys living in northeast Houston.
 
The guys piling out of that pos Buick was no threat
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Never underestimate someone based on their size. stature or how they present themselves. I assume nothing based on those things. I view everyone equally.

There was a barroom brawl once when I was younger. Someone took down 4 of 5 bouncers (all 200+), 2 responding officers and proceeded to lay a really good beating on the guys in county lock up. Each time the person was given the least bit of opportunity, overwhelming violence ensued. Who was this person? A tiny little 5'3" blonde dressed in your usual club attire that 99.99% of us wouldn't view as a threat. Who was she? A former kickboxing champion from overseas who happened to see her fiance with another woman. I also have a buddy who is an ex-LEO and dabbled in some amatuer UFC. He and 2 of his coworkers proceeded to get there rear ends handed to them on a platter by a 5'8", 135lb gay male prostitute after the same prostitute had beat down a local blood set (about 6 total) to the point on-lookers called an ambulance...all because they tried poking fun at the guy.

Sorry for the anecdotes, but I'm just saying it is hard to assess a threat visually. I assess a threat based on proximity and what could happen...and that has little bearing on what the person looks like.
 
Forum,actually I should have worded my statement that at that moment they did not appear to be threat or pose threatening behaviour.
Anyone obviously can go off regardless of their station in life.

Edit..left out a word.
 
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Considering a fuel hose as a defensive weapon is highly unorthodox and a very dangerous approach to avoiding attack
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.

I have a picture in my mind of the four hombres dousing the old man and torching him in response to any squirt gun antics....

If you're going to escalate, you better have a plan to win the fight.
 
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