Shotgun Help...

[Fred Fuller]

Shotgun Help, She Wrote...

Some days are just not going to work out for the best no matter what.

Here I am 60 miles from home in closest Big Metro, NC (Fayettenam as the oldtimers know it, Fatalville to a newer generation) running errands, about time to head home, about time for lots of businesses to close doors for the day. One more errand- an older model 12 gauge 870 Express on layaway that needed to be picked up and brought home. Another Cinderella gun, as if I needed one.

News flash- the days of the sub- $200 used 870- even Express guns- are limited. Hear ye, hear ye- get 'em while you still can, inflation draweth nigh. This one was $214 out the door, best deal available. For an old Express (pre- magazine tube dimples, pre- plastic trigger plate, pre- lawyerproof safety) it was still worth it to me. The gun was like new inside and out.

It was picking up that 870 that brought me to my favorite FFL, but it was another customer there who made me heartsick. A nice young lady, a GI bride whose hubby was off in some 'stan somewhere doing Uncle's bidding. A child of Texas, bless her and all her kin in that regard, and she had some spunk, she did.

I arrived a bit late to the game. When I got there she was holding a Mossberg 20 gauge pumpgun at port arms, and she had a barrage of questions flying at the counter help- who were happy to abandon her to me as soon as I showed an iota of interest. To their credit, it was a busy night in the store, and I have been known to attempt helpfulness before on the other side of the counter. Sometimes it even helps with a sale...

So the poor thing was abandoned to my tender mercies.

Her house had been broken into. She was worried. NOT scared. Worried. She had called her brother in Texas with gun questions. Brother in Texas had told her what to go get, apparently in complete detail save for the serial number of the specific shotgun she was supposed to find. She had found one meeting that description in my friend's establishment and she wasn't letting it go. And I wasn't about to argue over it.

She wasn't exactly sure what to do with it, but she wasn't putting it down.

So we spent a few minutes talking about shotguns. Slowly. Quietly. Calmly. Stance. Mount. Gun fit. Shoulder pocket. Safety and safe storage. Administrative stuff (no one had showed her the action release button yet). Running the gun. Recoil. Shot sizes. Loads. Patterns. Terminal effectiveness. What "gauge" means. I looked the gun over and in the process removed the magazine plug for her, explaining why it was there and assuring her there was no magazine limit for burglars, just for migratory birds. She actually laughed at that- probably because she was tense.

We talked about places to shoot locally. There are some options available to her, including the range on Ft. Bragg to which she has access as a military spouse. I did not want to be too forward, too overbearing. I gave her what contact information I could regarding her options, and left her to make up her own mind about how to proceed.

And we talked about some things non-shotgun but related to defensive use of same. Good locks on external doors, used ALWAYS. Window locks too. Dogs (she had one already, a pet not a protector, but a mobile alarm nevertheless). The bed as bunker (brother had told her that one already, she liked hearing it again). Keeping the cell phone charger at the bedside with the phone always in place there at bedtime. Keeping the saferoom dark and making sure there was backlight at the doorway with a nightlight etc.

For all she knew she was going to have to take that Mossberg home and use it that very night. It was an awful lot to confront in one short sitting.

I wish my wife had been there. I told this young lady she'd have been much better off if she had run into my wife and not me, and gave her my wife's cell number, and mine as well (I gave her the URL here too while I was at it- she might eventually read this). She would have been much, much better off with Fran doing what I was trying to do.

I wish there had been a place she could have gone to get some hands-on instruction, to actually shoot that Mossberg before she took it home and put it to work. I wish she didn't have to do all that stuff at all- I wish bad things (and worse) didn't happen to nice young ladies who were at home alone minding their own business. I wish she didn't have to buy a shotgun and try to learn everything about how to use it in extremis in 15 minutes from total strangers in a gunstore. I wish... .

She did the paperwork, the FBI check went through without a hitch, and she gathered up her shotgun and headed home.

Some days in the real world are just not going to work out for the best no matter what. Of course, things could always get worse. I sure hope they didn't get worse for her last night, and I hope they never do.

When she wrote down our phone numbers, she put down our names too, and then she wrote beside them the words "Shotgun help."

I hope she calls Fran...

I hope she can get some REAL 'shotgun help,' and soon. Mostly I hope she never needs it- for that matter I hope NONE of us ever do. But the only thing worse than needing 'shotgun help,' is to need it and not have it available. And I don't mean just training, either.

Stay Safe, friends...

lpl/nc

 

[sm]

Lee,
Thank you.

I got chills reading your post...you are one that knows why I got/ and still get chills about such a post.

Some days are just not going to work out for the best no matter what.

 

[foghornl]

Dang it....sometimes Life is just that way...You just KNOW that someone is going to be In Harm's Way, and there isn't much good coming from that.

We can only try to help prepare those good folks, and hope that it never comes down to NEEDING to use the shotgun.

I feel that I am prepared, but every day I hope that I never NEED to use a firearm to protect any of mine.

Lee, ya done what best ya could. There are always the 'no-good-niks' that will try to prey on those they consider to be less able to defend themselves. Does the leopard go after the lion? No, he goes after the lamb.

 

[Striker]

Some days are just not going to work out for the best no matter what.

Lee,

I'm confident that the lady is much better off for her chance meeting with you. You do what you can.....

 

[mswestfall]

Lee

Thanks for the post and taking the time to help someone that genuinely needs positive input.

I thank God that I live in a country where she can purchase a gun to defend herself and sorry I live in a country where she has to purchase a gun to defend herself.

I remember my Mother's story from the 1950's in Okinawa. She lived on-base and hid behind the toilet holding my sister in one arm and a .45 in the other while an escaped convict was trying to get in the door. It made me happy to know that she'd been taught how to defend herself.

Thanks again for helping her!

 

[Robert Hairless]

Well said and well done.

Heart is an essential component on both sides of such encounters. From the giver's side it can't be bought, only given freely as you did and do. I don't know if it can be developed on the recipient's side but its presence is easily recognized and its absence is sad to see.

 

[Fred Fuller]

Thanks, all. If you're the praying sort, I hope you'll offer up a little request for intercession for this young woman and all who are in her circumstances.

The article below explains one of the reasons she's worried.

lpl/nc
=====
http://www.fayobserver.com/article?id=284653

Published on Saturday, February 02, 2008
Fayetteville police seeking serial rapist
By Erinn McGuire
Staff writer

Fayetteville police say the same man has committed at least three rapes in north Fayetteville in the past 18 months.

Police would not say how they have linked the crimes but are urging residents to be aware of their surroundings.

“In each of these incidents, we believe the suspect used at least a minimal amount of surveillance and preparation when selecting the victims,” said Detective Chuck Dew on Friday.

Dew is heading up the investigation. “We are asking people to be vigilant and look for suspicious persons or activities,” he said.

Investigators say the man is responsible for the rape of a 23-year-old woman on Aug. 23, 2006. She was jogging near the Ramsey Street and Oates Drive area when she was attacked from behind.

In the second rape on Feb. 12, 2007, a man broke into a 45-year-old woman’s Bubblecreek Court condo.

“I was dead asleep, and he was shaking me to wake me up,” said the rape victim Friday from her West Coast home. “He already had a hold of me by then.”

She said the rapist put his hand over her mouth.

The Fayetteville Observer does not name the victims of sexual assaults.

The third rape came about seven months later when a 21-year-old woman was raped by a man who broke into her Heather Ridge apartment.

Police said the suspect in the rapes has also been linked to at least one of a series of peeping Tom incidents in the Whispering Pines subdivision in Harnett County north of Fayetteville.

The Peeping Tom incidents occurred throughout 2004, police said.

The most recent sexual assault to occur in the north Fayetteville area was reported last weekend.

Again, a woman living on Bubblecreek Court was attacked. Sometime between 2:15 and 3:15 a.m. on Jan. 26, a man broke into a 29-year-old woman’s condo and sexually assaulted her, police said. He was wearing black shoes, dark jeans and a dark-colored hooded sweatshirt with the words “Notre Dame” across the chest, police said.

Investigators said they have not connected Saturday’s attack with the previously reported rapes but are looking into that possibility, Dew said.

The number of reported rapes decreased slightly last year, according to Fayetteville police statistics.

In 2007, there were 60 rapes reported, down from 63 in 2006, according to police statistics. In 2005, 51 rapes were reported within the city’s limits. A total of 45 rapes were reported to police in 2004.

On Friday night, a 35-year-old woman who has lived in the King’s Grant Condominiums for the past two years said she had had enough and was moving out.

Brown boxes filled the back seats of two cars parked in front of her second-story apartment.

The woman asked that her name not be used.

In the time that she’s lived in the complex, the woman said the steel door to her apartment has been kicked in, a Peeping Tom was spotted peering into one of her neighbor’s windows, another neighbor had his car stolen and someone has “messed with the door knob while I’m home,” she said.

She said she has called the police numerous times while living there.

“That’s the one good thing, though,” she said. “If you call, they’re here in like two minutes. They don’t disregard you.”

Another female resident, who was walking with her dog in the community Friday night, had similar stories.

She said her 23-year-old daughter, who had also lived in the condos before moving out, had been burglarized twice in a two-year span.

The woman, who also asked not to be named since her husband is deployed, said she was thankful for her Jack Russell terrier, Spartacus.

“If anyone comes to the door, he’ll slam against it,” she said. “He sounds like he’s a lot bigger than he really is.”

She said she’s not afraid but stays alert and keeps Spartacus with her when she goes running in the neighborhood.

The victim from the Feb. 12, 2007, rape said she has also acquired a dog since moving west.

She has a Doberman pinscher now — and a gun.

“Whenever you go through something like that, for the most part, you tend to just block it out,” she said. “I think your mind blocks those things out, like a defense mechanism.”

Staff writer Erinn McGuire can be reached at [email protected] or 486-3567.

 

[Dave McCracken]

Thanks for your efforts, Lee.

Every woman should know how to shoot and possess the means to do so.

 

[bcolorado]

Lee, you offered her hope...

and being a praying sort, a long distance away, I will offer prayers for her safety in these times

b

 

[ceetee]

Good job, Lee. If any of my daughters are in that situation, and I'm not around to guide them, I hope they run into someone such as you, to do what I would if I could.