If you're going to avoid intervening in a situation where your very presence could save a life this is NOT the excuse to use. It detracts from the credibility of many of your arguments. "I'm not going to get involved beyond video taping and witnessing because I'm afraid someone might retaliate" If that's the case you have no business being in this country's military service. Are you going to stay in the barracks when the rest of your unit goes on patrol because yesterday your unit was involved in a firefight with BGs and you're afraid their friends might shoot at you?
Sure toughguy.... internet heros are a dime a dozen. Next time you deploy, in the real world (not in junior boyscout boot camp), and live in 'barracks' you let us know. I've lived in tents, patrol bases, and CHUs myself in my real world deployments.
And
I am so disappointed in what our society has evolved into. The responses by the majority of you are truely disgusting.
I contend that if you cannot help your fellow man, not just your loved ones, then you are unfit to carry a concealed gun.
PPPLLLLEEEEAAASSSEEE - There are a lot of internet heros here...
WHO ARE YOU HELPING??? NOBODY HAS BEEN ABLE TO ANSWER THAT QUESTION!!!!
You are ASSUMING that your internvetion is going to SAVE a life. That's a big assumption. It could cost lives. Whose life? I dunno. Maybe your daughter's life. Maybe a strangers life. Maybe your wife's life. Maybe the lives of the firefighters called to extinsguish your enferno house that the gangbangers decided to burn. I dunno. What I do have enough smarts to know is that I don't intervene in the middle of domestic disputes or gang fights. From the description, this appeared to be possibly both.
You are also assuming a positive peaceful resolution to this matter. That is a dangerous assumption. You go out there and try to intervene - what if the men with bats turn on YOU, and view you as a sympathiser with the others? That pretty much forces your hand to kill one or several of them. Or what if the men with bats were holding off the armed attacks of the others, but your distraction allows the actual aggressors to regain the upper hand and retrieve their lost weapons and fire at you or others? Maybe the cops will be there in 1 minute. Maybe 20 minutes. Are you going to place people under citizen arrest? The fact is you have no effective plan - and people without plans in these situations get into deep and hot water fast.
The reality is that your CCW permit, or your ownership of a home defense shotgun, is not some police detective badge or permit to go chasing and arresting 'bad guys.' That's how innocent people get killed. You wanna go foray into the middle of some large domestic disturbance with a dozen folks armed with bats and whatnot, yelling "HI-HO Silver" then I'm not going to try to talk sense into you. Have fun with the results you get, none of which will be positive.
Do you think the group of gangbangers is going to thank you for saving them? Do you think the group with the bats is going to thank you for interfering? I doubt the answer will be yes to either of these. Instead both groups will probably look at you with scorn and derision.
Getting in the middle of what could very well be a gang fight is asking for a quick exit from this world. That's not cowardly, that's sensible.