My daughter came to my room and said she heard an accident. I just heard a loud boom and thought it was thunder. We walked outside and saw the neighbors mailbox in our yard, and our mailbox was missing. Looked across the road and saw a truck had wrecked. My daughter handed me her phone and I...
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OP on first page....
""""My daughter came to my room and said she heard an accident. I just heard a loud boom and thought it was thunder. We walked outside and saw the neighbors mailbox in our yard, and our mailbox was missing. Looked across the road and saw a truck had wrecked.
My daughter handed me her phone and I called 911.
I told my daughter to go back inside. While she walked back inside, a person got out of the truck and started walking towards me. I had my handgun in my hand and the flashlight in the right hand. The person started walking towards me. I put the light on him and told him to stop and put his hands up. He put his hands up but continued walking towards me. He lowered his hands and put them in his coat pocket. I pointed my gun at him and told him again to stop and keep h is hands up. He was in the center of the road at that point. I didn't want him coming towards me and I didn't want him to get hit by a car, so I told him to walk backwards and keep his hands up. When he got out of the road I told him to get on the ground. He didn't He turned around and started going to his truck. The officers showed up at that point. Officer told me to put my gun down. I complied. After they secured the person they talked to me and got my information. I'll pace it off in the morning when it's daylight, but it looks like the guy ran off the road about 100 yards from my house.
They worked the scene and the person was taken away in a patrol car.
My neighbors mailbox and pole it was on was about 40 yards from where it was supposed to be. Mine was 52 yards away from where it was! He also took out a power pole, and a brick wall. Guy looked ok physically, no noticeable injuries so that's good. Officers smelled alcohol, and charged him with DUI. These were officers in the same department I worked for, but weren't here when I was with the department. Never met them before, and they didn't know I was a cop, retired now. Glad the guy who pointed his gun at me and told me to drop mine didn't shoot me first, ask later. That was pretty intense."""""
AFTER THE ENTIRTE SITE DOGPILED HIM FOR OWNING A GUN---------------------------------------------------------------
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I'll try this on a almost dead laptop, running on battery, using phone for hotspot lol.
So, a little back story for those that don't know already. In 2012, I was hit by a car while on duty. I had a severe traumatic brain injury and I no longer have the ability to convert short term memory to long term memory. "50 first dates" is real, and that's exactly how I have to deal with every single day.
So, when my daughter woke me up in her highly anxious state, I got up, got my gun out of the safe where it is stored, and as far as I knew, I was still a police officer in 2012. Now that being said, I used what I had available at the time of the incident. I won't say it was justified, but it is what happened. My daughter was scared, she said, when I told the guy to stop, and I identified myself as a police officer. When he kept walking towards me, I told him again to put his hands up and stop, after saying "police officer". He did put his hands up and stopped about 10 feet from me. At no time was I prepared to shoot him. I only used the weapon as a barrier so to speak. No I shouldn't have, but it did get my point across. He in no way looked to be concussed, delirious, bleeding, in paid, or any other medical issue that would have stopped him from understanding me or following instructions. When got close enough and saw I had a weapon, he was completely responsive.
I was never trained to use my weapon unless needed. My training kicked in for sure, but not in the best way possible. I can't think of any other way to explain how it went and how I reacted. When the cops arrived, they did a good job. They didn't know who I was, and all they saw was a gun. One officer checked on the driver, and the other pointed their gun at me, an armed unknown person. They did what they were trained to do. I identified myself to them as a police officer, and said I was dropping my gun.
All this talk about me being part of the system, brotherhood, pig, etc., is completely untrue. I've never supported "I feared for my life" and I never will. I think I've pulled my weapon out on three people in my 13 year career. I'd have to go back and look. One I know for sure. He had a sword and an axe right in front of me. I've never shot anyone, or shot my service weapon outside of fire arms qualification.
Talking with my wife and kids about the situation, and reading the comments here, helped me put things together in a better way. So I'll address my thoughts on how I handled it.
1. I don't know for sure what this guy was going to do, he wouldn't listen, I did what I thought was the best to get his attention. I don't think I was wrong in a legal sense, but I do know that isn't how I was trained. I should have talked more. I can say since it happened, not having the gun wouldn't have put me in any danger. I just didn't feel like that when I went outside to begin with. Yes, poor judgement in that respect.
2. If I had been 100% alert to my injuries, knowing I wasn't an officer, I would have stayed inside. My wife talked about that with me. Helped me understand that I'm not the same person I was those years ago and I have to keep working on getting that out of my system every day. It's hard. It's really hard to understand every day that I'm almost eight years beyond that day and I only know it because I read about it every day.
3. All the insults and jabs, dog piling, etc., doesn't affect me at all. I understand where everyone is coming from and why. I deserved it and I won't feel bad towards a single person that responded in this thread, or any other police related threads.
4. All those that are glad they aren't in an accident so they won't get shot, etc. That isn't something you should be worried about. Again, I didn't have any intention to shoot him unless I saw a weapon that he wouldn't let go of. I've worked close to a thousand accidents, and dozens at or around the time this happened, and I've never reacted the way I did today.
I'm on limited battery so I need to close this out for now. I'll try and reply and read with the phone if possible.""""""
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