TexasCHLforum.com

grim-bob wrote:Assuming the police aren't coming anytime soon and you want to give them a nudge without directly confronting them. Don't remember seeing this idea but it seems the perfect time to use a panic alarm on your car's remote (assuming it has one). Most people like this don't like any extra attention and having a panic alarm going off repeatedly draws just that. They may assume the alarm is from them bumping the car since you are out of sight in the building. The chance of them damaging the car out of anger is still there but not as likely to occur or at least occur to a lesser degree since they aren't teaching "you" a lesson.

If your car alarm will respond to a signal from your key fob at the distance required, I'd say this tactic is worth a try.

It could even be used by strolling nearby while paying the group no attention whatsoever and triggering the fob from your pocket.

Clever thought. I like it.

Oldgringo wrote:Thank you, Excaliber, for guiding us through this discussion and sharing your experiences and training.

The scenario presented by the OP is a virtual no-win situation for the average Joe/Jane on the street whether armed or not. Call the police, they'll come by sooner or later. Call 'em again, it's their job to "serve and protect". (BTW, no one mentioned setting off the Fire Alarm in the building in which you were trapped )

OldGringo, if I've been of service, it's been my pleasure.

Folks, this whole discussion has been difficult because it involves discussion of the behavior of criminals in groups. This is a topic that is very seldom discussed at length in CHL circles, and when the topic comes up, so do lots of misconceptions and bad assumptions.

In my LEO days, I very often dealt with group situations. Here are some of the things I learned (sometimes the hard way):

1. Always call for backup. Never approach an apparently hostile group alone.
2. Don't take a position that doesn't have a clear and unobstructed escape route.
3. Watch for flanking and escape cutoff maneuvers. Not all group members may be in the obvious cluster.
4. Don't take physical action against a group member until you have enough force present to protect the contact officers and ensure a safe extraction.
5. If you know physical action must be taken (e.g., arrest of a wanted felon) bring overwhelming force. On the street, there's no shame in surrender when it's obvious the resources are there to make it happen anyway. It's when there's doubt about which side the balance of force falls on that things get dangerous. Safety lies in removing the temptation to fight.
6. Remember that all individuals are much more dangerous in the group than they are alone. They can be easily led to do things they'd never attempt alone.

Remember, these are the guidelines armed, trained, well equipped and experienced police officers used.

With all this being said, the simple fact is if a single individual finds a hostile group occupying his vehicle and a polite request doesn't get good results, there is no one man tactic I know of that is likely to turn out well. "Tactical repositioning" (backing off) without further confrontation and securing appropriate additional resources to address the issue is without question the best option for having things come out reasonably well.

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:

Hoi Polloi wrote:

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:In my version the leader of the group is a clean cut 21 y/o frat boy closer to 155lbs, but I guess it doesn't really matter. I would again ask him to find elsewhere to hang out. If he keeps me from entering my vehicle by physically blocking my way I would consider that a physical threat. At that point I would be close enough to take a clear cell phone photo of the guy's face. He probably wouldn't like that and might even try to ge the phone from me, that would be a physical assault. Appropriate measures would have to be taken.

Hope I didn't leave you hanging too long.

A gang of 8 drunken frat boys who are feet from you would be on you like white on rice while you're holding your cell phone trying to take a picture. They'd leave you bloodied, bruised, and you'd be lucky if your phone wasn't smashed to smithereens and you weren't unconscious. But the frat boys probably would move on without messing with your ride.

If it was a less savory crowd which perhaps included a kid with some theft history, your car would be brutally keyed, your shoes and wallet gone, your phone smashed if old or gone if new, your glasses in shards, and you'd be lucky if someone else saw it and called 911 for you in time.

What makes you think that you and your cell phone could take on a group of 8 drunks who are feet from you and intent on causing you bodily harm? There wouldn't be enough time to blink and even if you could unholster, draw, and fire in time, they'd hit you from behind in seconds. And that's assuming they don't have weapons of their own.

That is simply too many and too close, and the preposterous idea that you'd be using both your hands to snap a pic when you understand they'll be coming at you swinging seems like a particularly bad idea.

Just to clarify, I prefer brown rice, I don't wear glasses, and can snap a photo with one hand.
I never said I would allow myslef to get surrounded by a group of thugs by walking into the middle of their group. I may be irrational but I'm not dumb.

You wouldn't have to walk into a group to get surrounded by thugs. All you'd have to do is stand close enough to take an identifiable picture for a couple of seconds while the group's "wing men" execute their well practiced flanking maneuver for situations like this. By the time you figured out what was going on, you'd be the unhappy "man in the middle" with the group leader at bad breath range in your face, the guys behind you making sure you don't get froggy while they figure out what to do with you, and the rest of the group gathered all around making suggestions that you probably wouldn't find comforting.

Hoi Polloi wrote:

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:In my version the leader of the group is a clean cut 21 y/o frat boy closer to 155lbs, but I guess it doesn't really matter. I would again ask him to find elsewhere to hang out. If he keeps me from entering my vehicle by physically blocking my way I would consider that a physical threat. At that point I would be close enough to take a clear cell phone photo of the guy's face. He probably wouldn't like that and might even try to ge the phone from me, that would be a physical assault. Appropriate measures would have to be taken.

Hope I didn't leave you hanging too long.

A gang of 8 drunken frat boys who are feet from you would be on you like white on rice while you're holding your cell phone trying to take a picture. They'd leave you bloodied, bruised, and you'd be lucky if your phone wasn't smashed to smithereens and you weren't unconscious. But the frat boys probably would move on without messing with your ride.

If it was a less savory crowd which perhaps included a kid with some theft history, your car would be brutally keyed, your shoes and wallet gone, your phone smashed if old or gone if new, your glasses in shards, and you'd be lucky if someone else saw it and called 911 for you in time.

What makes you think that you and your cell phone could take on a group of 8 drunks who are feet from you and intent on causing you bodily harm? There wouldn't be enough time to blink and even if you could unholster, draw, and fire in time, they'd hit you from behind in seconds. And that's assuming they don't have weapons of their own.

That is simply too many and too close, and the preposterous idea that you'd be using both your hands to snap a pic when you understand they'll be coming at you swinging seems like a particularly bad idea.

I was trying to encourage you to think through a full sequence of your actions and a realistic set of likely reactions from the group being confronted until you reached a resolution. We didn't get all the way there, but we did move forward a couple of steps.

Taking pictures with the cell phone and then taking "appropriate action" if someone in the group made an effort to liberate your phone would get you to just about the same spot as the scenario described in an earlier post where the car owner pushes one of the drunks off the fender.

Hoi has graphically described how this would be likely to play out on the street with drunken frat boys. The meth fueled gang banger version led by the 275 lb. guy with the prison tats has a much less happy ending.

The point is that stuff that sounds downright impressive when kicked around at the local watering hole can get you stomped right quick in the street.

I would strongly suggest thinking through all the steps and likely responses in a plausible start to finish situation management sequence before trying this stuff for real. I think you'll find that what you end up with that way is a much better and safer plan.

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:

SlowDave wrote:

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:If a "group" of uninvited strangers decide to make themselves at home on the hood of my truck, I am not waiting an hour or so for the police to come and tell them to move along.

So you're gonna....?

1. Go with the proven technique of the OP and get your car dinged up and then go home with them knowing your identity and workplace?
2. Go confront them and win or maybe die that night over car dings?
3. Just open fire pre-emptively and hope you kill them all before they get you and then take off and hope the cops don't figure out who you are?
4. #3 but hang around and pay for the ensuing legal battle to show that you had the right to do it? Maybe $100k vs. the $1k to fix the car.

Okay, a bit tongue-in-cheek, but realistically, we're in a situation here with a multitude of bad responses to choose from. Least bad seems to be the one you've ruled out, IMHO.

I answered this with a subsequent post.

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:I would ask politly and respectfully for them to find elsewhere to sit. Whatever happens after that would be up to them.

I would probably get in my truck and move it. If they tried to keep me from entering my truck that is their prerogative.

All the easy parts have now been covered. This is where it gets interesting.

What's the next move if they act true to form - they all laugh uproariously and the 275 lb prison tattooed spokesman for the group gets up, leans his back against the drivers' door, folds his arms, and smirks?

Please don't leave us hanging in suspense.

The Annoyed Man wrote:

ironsights wrote:I agree with the advice given however, and should have called police instantly. It is true that i might have backlash from this and would normally think that way but its true in a high stress situation that you lose alot of your abilities. I feel like i acted poorly in this situation and am thankful for all of your insight.

And that, my friend, shows a teachable attitude. Given the massive frustration of the whole thing, it would be easy to see why you originally reacted the way you did. I might well have done so myself. But the value of this thread is that we all get to check our attitudes at the door and learn from your experience, without having to suffer any painful lessons.

Be safe out there, and I hope that aren't the subject of any revenge actions.

Well said, TAM.

Thanks to ironsights' post, everyone on the Forum has had a chance to think this situation through and evaluate the likely outcome and consequences of a whole range of options. Afterwards, everyone ends up refining his own "library" of contingency plans that can be drawn upon when such situations come up instead of facing the same dilemma as the OP did when he faced the incident in his post. From one man's painful experience and his willingness to share it comes productive learning for many.

This is a very good thing.

WildBill wrote:

Oldgringo wrote:I'm with Keith B and Excaliber All The Way (ATW) on this one. SALUT!

Since no one else mentioned it, I will: what if you (one) show your weapon and then the drunken thugs (several) pull theirs? What then?

The OP never said how many thugs and girlfriends there were on his car.

The OP cited a "group" which I'd read as 3 or more unless otherwise clarified.

However, OldGringo's question would still be valid even if only one BG pulled a gun - the OP's response to that might be?

Things would certainly have rapidly gotten much uglier than they did.

Keith B wrote:I would have called the police first, without confronting them. All confronting them does is irritate them, they do their deads and leave before the police get there. If you call the police first, don't let them see you, then the police are the witness that they were actually on your car, and if there is any damage, even if you can't get money out of the thugs for repairs, your insurance will have another witness.

Now, as for legal, once they started doing damage to the car, this is criminal mischief. If it is happening at night, legally you can use deadly force. HOWEVER, that would be a dumb thing to do IMO. Taking a life over someone doing repairable damage to your car is not what carrying is about. Besides, you will have a lot less hassle and paperwork to do on the car damage than you will a shooting investigation.

IANAL, BTW

I agree with Keith.

If you mess things up yourself first, it's pretty hard for the police to make everything right. Consider that when they got there, they found:

1. Instead of calling them to deal with the situation, you had challenged a group of drunk street hoods. By nature, these folks are not about backing down and letting things drop because they've been seen, and you'll have a long wait for an apology. They're much more about teaching you a lesson about not messing with them again.

2. The hoods responded exactly as I would expect, and worked on your lesson and produced the effect they wanted - total frustration and expensive damage you will have to have repaired on your own with no consequences to themselves whatsoever.

3. You couldn't name the people involved, and all you could provide for identification is grainy pictures with resolution too poor to serve for identification purposes.

What exactly would you expect the police to do with that beyond taking a report?

Consider also that if you had taken Keith's approach and called the police with the thugs none the wiser, the police would have arrived, seen exactly who was involved (there's an excellent chance they'd know them on sight), gotten them off your car, sent them on their way, and the deliberate damage wouldn't have occurred at all. The thugs also wouldn't know whose car it was or where the owner worked, as they do now. Your "lesson" may not be over.

In other words, you would have gotten what you pay taxes for - if you had only asked for police response before you drove the situation 'way south on your own.