Yet Another Reason I Carry

Yesterday at about 1350 I was at the Pick Quick in Auburn. While waiting for my food this guy collects his order and goes out to his red Chevy pickup. It was a work truck, like a 2500 or 3500.
A gold Explorer being driven by another male pulls up behind him and the passenger door opens. A blonde female jumps out and runs over to one of the garbage cans with a bag of trash. She left her door open.
While she is doing this the Chevy begins to backup toward the Explorer. Never even checks his mirrors.
Explorer, seeing the impending collision puts his vehicle in reverse and backs out of the way.
Chevy sees the Explorer backing up, stops and waits for the vehicle to move then continues backing out of the space.
The two vehicles are facing each other.
The Explorer begins to move forward to clear the area. Chevy gets impatient and hits the gas then slams on the brakes. This causes the Explorer to hesitate.
The Explorer then drives by the Chevy and both vehicles stop. I see the Chevy driver crack open his door and lean out while looking back at the Explorer.
At this time my food is ready. I turn to the counter to grab my food then glance over my shoulder to see Chevy is out of his vehicle with something T-shaped and metal about a foot and a half long and he is running at the Explorer. The Explorer floors it and gets out of there.
I look at the kids behind the counter and tell them to call the cops. I look back outside to see Chevy getting back in his truck.
The kids look at me and go, "Huh?"
I yell at them, "Call the cops now!"
I then run outside with two employees behind me. I try to get the license plate number but all I can see is it is a Washington plate. I run around the other side of the building to try again but the truck is gone.
I go back inside with the employees and tell them again to call the cops. They say ok and disapear around the counter.
I ask the cashier if the guy payed cash or credit. I tell her his receipt is number 84. (He got his food right before me)
She checks and sure enough he used a card. His name is right on the receipt. At this point the manager is standing right next to her.
I tell him to make sure and give that to the cops when they show up. He says sure.
I go sit down and begin eating my lunch. I finished my fries and am thinking that I haven't heard anybody call the cops and there seems to be a severe lack of activity behind the counter.
I go back up to the counter and ask if they called the police. The manager looks at me and says with a puzzled expression, "No."
I say, "Why the hell not?"
He tells me, "Well, nothing actually happened. If the cops show up I'll give them the receipt but other than that there is nothing I can do."
I look him right in the eye, "Are you kidding me! A crime just happened in your parking lot! Two people just got chased out of here with a weapon and are probably getting beat to death right now because you didn't call the police!"
I pull out my cell phone and dial 911. Meanwhile, other customers are looking up from their personal bubbles and saying, "Wait. What happened?"
Apparently out of the ten people there I was the only one that saw anything.
I tell 911 what happened. A couple minutes after I hang up the Auburn Dispatch calls me for a confirmation of the description. When I do the dispatcher says, "Oh, good! Yeah they picked him up down the street. The police are interviewing the victims now."
After we got off the phone I went back up to the counter to tell the supervisor what happened. Again he tries to say he didn't see anything and there was nothing he could do.
I cut him off and said," The next time a customer tells you to call the cops, twice, then runs out the door and a truck is screaming out of the lot, call the police!"
He tries to say that it happened so fast.
I tell him when something does happen it is almost always fast. But when someone looks directly at you and says call the cops then just do it. Don't argue about it.
Then he asks me if my food was ok.
I nodded and left.
From the time Chevy left his vehicle to when he got back in seemed to be less than 10-12 seconds. It's hard to say.
It was so frustrating that this guy told me he was calling and never did. It is frustrating that a grown man seemed to have no comprehension of the consequences for not calling the police. It is equally frustrating that the average citizen seems to have no SA.
I do not know if Chevy succeeded in attacking Explorer but he sure scared the hell out of them!
Afterwards I realized I should have been the one to call 911 in the first place. That would have been interesting trying to juggle a cell phone and keeping my H&K from popping out of the open top holster I had on under my jacket all while running. I normally wear SERPAs with all my guns but occasionally I wear something else.
Looking forward to your thoughts.

Interesting. It sounds like you learned a lesson that you should indeed have been the one to call 911 a bit earlier. You were the one who saw the most and cared the most. Good job!

Command presence FAIL!

You need to be more forceful. Make it NOT an option to not comply.......

TechnoWeenie said:

Command presence FAIL!

You need to be more forceful. Make it NOT an option to not comply.......

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The kid was an idiot.
I pointed right at his face and specifically told him to call the cops. I told him twice. Trust me I was very forceful.

When telling someone to call the police you need to make sure what they are going to tell the cops, in this case he did not see or know what was going on and really had nothing to tell them, this is a lesson learned.
It is often better to tell 3 people to call the police from what I remember in training it was often said that 1 out of 3 will actually call.

BigDave said:

When telling someone to call the police you need to make sure what they are going to tell the cops, in this case he did not see or know what was going on and really had nothing to tell them, this is a lesson learned.
It is often better to tell 3 people to call the police from what I remember in training it was often said that 1 out of 3 will actually call.

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After I went back in the Manager said he would be calling the police. He was fully aware of what happened because I told him what I saw. It wasn't until almost ten minutes later he told me he didn't see anything and that he didn't call. What I learned from this is people are stupid/selfish so in the future I'll just make the call myself.

decklin said:

After I went back in the Manager said he would be calling the police. He was fully aware of what happened because I told him what I saw. It wasn't until almost ten minutes later he told me he didn't see anything and that he didn't call. What I learned from this is people are stupid/selfish so in the future I'll just make the call myself.

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Now don't go off Stomp Stomp Stomp, my reply was addressing the first portion of your post when you told the manager to call the police while you where on your way out the door. There will be many different views in an incident do to people actually acknowledge there is an issue and from when they start to view the incident.
Ones objective it to get assistance on the way and one cannot assume that the ones you tell to call for help actually know what help is needed and what is occurring otherwise they call 911 and state I need the cops here, and when asked what is going on he replies I don't know this guy ran out of the restaurant and told me to call...., ranted it would be nice if they were also aware of what just occurred as you did but often not.
Something along the lines Call 911 there's an assault with a weapon, red Chevy pickup. 2500 or 3500 and a gold Explorer leaving in their direction of travel.
Will that guarantee they will call, no but it will provide needed information, and of course call yourself as soon as you are able to, the point here is to get assistance for those in need as quickly as possible.

Thank you Decklin, for being a responsible citizen. Community involvement is what this country is sorely lacking.

Attention Getters

I recall something similar several years ago where I was the subject of "pool training" in a diver rescue scenario.
I acknowledge it does not hold the same urgency as what you described, but it does remind me the general public is oblivious to what is going on around them. I make that as a general blanket statement as most folks go on about their business until you get their attention or cause enough commotion that everyone is focused on you. You cannot call 911 from the water so you damn well better get someone’s attention if you want help. To get it done, you have to get everyone to focus on you, or....do it yourself.

Take my word for it, there was no doubt in that pool what the requirement/need was. While it is a risk you take to bring that much attention to yourself it could be life saving. I cannot say what I may have done in your shoes but at least you did something.

~Whitney

BigDave said:

Now don't go off Stomp Stomp Stomp, my reply was addressing the first portion of your post when you told the manager to call the police while you where on your way out the door. There will be many different views in an incident do to people actually acknowledge there is an issue and from when they start to view the incident.
Ones objective it to get assistance on the way and one cannot assume that the ones you tell to call for help actually know what help is needed and what is occurring otherwise they call 911 and state I need the cops here, and when asked what is going on he replies I don't know this guy ran out of the restaurant and told me to call...., ranted it would be nice if they were also aware of what just occurred as you did but often not.
Something along the lines Call 911 there's an assault with a weapon, red Chevy pickup. 2500 or 3500 and a gold Explorer leaving in their direction of travel.
Will that guarantee they will call, no but it will provide needed information, and of course call yourself as soon as you are able to, the point here is to get assistance for those in need as quickly as possible.

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I wasn't upset. I was just conveying info already in my post or that I should have explained better. I completely understand what you are saying.
I didn't realize that the people right next to me did not see the man running through their lot with a weapon. I went outside to try and get a plate number that I could relay back to the operator via the employee.
I did not expect them to see everything with as much detail as I did (I have lots of practice) but I thought they at least saw the guy chasing the Explorer and would call 911.
The thing that really blew my mind was even after the manager was fully aware of exactly what happened in the lot he still did not understand why that was a bad thing. He just kept saying, "But nothing happened."
I'm guessing he didn't see the problem since no blood had been spilled on the property.

He probably did not see it because it did not happen to him... and smack him between his eyes...

Haha, probably!

doesn't suprise me. people these days would rather turn head and ignore then help another human. selfish. If it is not happening to them then it is not happening. the manager is the kind of guy that would see a women being attacked in a alley and walk away due to being scared of harm. good for you for givin a darn. yell "fire" and not "help" cause people might come and help if there is a fire, do not remember where I heard that but it is true.

I worked for a while doing 911 dispatch, and I learned a few lessons.
1) Never be afraid to call about anyting that a reasonable person would consider out of the ordinary. If it's not an immediate emergency (such as what was described above) then call the local non-emergency dipatch number (in my area the 2 dispatch centers answered both 911 and non-emergency calls, so they could prioritize dispatch accordingly.
2) If there is anything about the situation that could be considered aggressive, violent or involve a weapon then say that first. I never had to make "triage prioritization" with calls, but I do know that if there is anything immenent then there is priority given over a lesser call.
3) In most cases if you don't want to give your name or address or info about yourself you don't have to. I some cases a dispatcher may need you to identify yourself if an officer arrives on scene but cannot observe what you saw to have probable cause to use you as the witness for the stop.
4) Don't engage in a "pursuit". I've had a few scenarios where I have not "given pursuit", but it was by mere coincidence that the vehicle I'm still on the line with dispatch giving up to details about because the driver is obviously impaired in some manner is heading the same direction I was. I learned the do not pursue/they must be heading the same way I was technique after making a 911 call after some punk opened my passenger door at night and tried to get in my car until he noticed I was going to pull something unhealthy out - I stayed on the line with dispatch as I pursued and they told me to stop following and I told them "Negative.". I lost the car as I wasn't willing to speed through the neighborhood at the rate they were going, had one cop threaten me for the pursuit in that situation. But who's to say the vehicle you are calling on isn't coincidentally heading the same way that you are.

Also, I'll have to agree that it is very unfortunate that you cannot rely on others to listen or react accordingly to emergency situations. One of the best inventions to come along that aid with emergency response summoning is a blue tooth device - you are hands free giving the right people continuous updates. If a situation were to escalate and you had no alternative but to employ a firearm a bluetooth device means that your hands are free to operate and all the background sounds are there to corroborate the justification of lethal force.

Again, I used to work 911 dispatch. Things have probably changed in the last few years, and every city/county handles situations differently and have their own SOPs. This is just what I have come to know and practice based on my experiences.

As an anecdotal aside, a few years back it was summertime and I had my windows open at night as I worked on an art piece. I thought I heard something outside so I called the non-emergency line first thing (live in a gang neighborhood). As I go outside with my bluetooth I assess the situation and give them an up to date on what's going on . . . this is the only time I have ever drawn my weapon and pointed it at a living being prepared to take a shot. I couldn't differentiate the victim from the assailants (there ended up being 4-6 v. 1), so I did not take a shot, however I relayed to 911 dispatch there was a life/death situation and the police eventually arrived. I informed dispatch who I was, that I was armed and that I did not want to be taken down - resopnding officer #1 wanted me to walk to my house and disarm (complied to comfort PD and speed along their investigation). In the end PD was not pleased that I was armed, nor did they afford advice as to my queries regarding how better to respond to such a situation to facilitate justice under due process. Perps were never caught (4-6 w/baseball bat v 1 unarmed) but in the end I knew I was the reason that kid didn't die. Had some neighbors also witness the attack and they were not pleased the police were summoned (it occured on there property, but I have reason to believe they are involved with drugs.).

With that, I'm sorry that folks didn't react the way the should have in your situation but I'd look at them the way I look at the way I used to be - I didn't know what I do now, not about 911, emergency situations or OCing. Sounds to me like you did the best that you could have. If you had the interest I'd consider checking on your local 911 dispatch website and try to arrange a tour - I've a degree of certainty that most of us OC for SHTF scenarios, but I also believe most of us also carry the conviction to call LEO on dangerous situations that aren't Life or Death in a manner that our carrying could matter. Having said that, information is a valuable tool just waiting to be utilized.

Lastly, getting a plate number can help LEO a tremendous amount. I've known this since I worked 911 but have failed to get a plate number a few times. Just like most things it is a matter of habit and repetition, so I play a game when driving now where I try and remember numbers of plates that pass me in town and verify them if I catch up to them at the next light.

How does one go about getting a job doing 911 dispatch? I think I could do that.

Pick quick? Never herd of it

fire suppressor said:

Pick quick? Never herd of it

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We have had several meets in the warmer months at the original Pick-Quick in Fife.....



http://forum.opencarry.org/forums/s...Quick-Drive-In-Fife-6pm)&highlight=Pick+Quick