Interesting Robbery Shootout with IPSC Grandmaster

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Micahweeks,

Are you a law enforcement officer? If so, I have to wonder about your below reply to this quote:

I am a business owner. I would not use deadly force to defend or recover property and would be extremely angry with anyone who tried to do so on my behalf.
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Here was your reply, the one I would question:

Really? How easy my job would be if Memphis business owners felt that way. Or Mississippians for that matter. I could just resond to a call and sit in my patrol vehicle until it's over then go write a report! And everyone would thank me for not being so foolish as to try and defend their stuff!

Just like all those YouTube commentators that think it is reckless to pursue speeders! They'll all thank me for not chasing reckless drivers and adding to the danger already on the road.

I'm just saying that YOU may not want stuff protected, but, believe me, I hear a plethora of gripes everyday from people who do. I respect your feelings on it, truly. I just have to hear to much to the contrary for my taste and have to accommodate them, too.
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Are you implying that you would indeed use deadly force to protect a shop keeper's property? So if someone stole some jewelry, even at gun point, then was making a get away, would you shoot him even if he was not at that point posing a threat to someone else? Note that the person to whom you replied did not say he would not use deadly force to defend a life, nor did he say that he does not want his property protected, but simply that as a business owner he would not use deadly force, and would be angry with others who did use it, to merely recover or defend his property. He was not, it seems, talking about justifiably shooting someone who posed a threat of serious bodily injury or death.

While the law may allow you to use deadly force on fleeing felons, I am fairly certain that even then the requirement, in most jurisdictions that allow such, is that the fleeing felon poses an imminent threat to someone. You seem to have implied you would use deadly force merely to recover property or protect it. Is that legal in your jurisdiction? Even if legal, can you understand how some people may not think their property is worth taking a life?

Me personally, I'd like to see the thugs brought down right out. I would like to have seen Thalheimer get them all, but that is only a small part of my personal view point. Then again there are laws and truth be told, I choose to follow the law over that personal desire (yet while trying to change the law through legal options to make it easier to get the bad guys) and not become a thug myself so long as the laws are not tyranical and unjust to the extreme.

All the best,
Glenn B
 
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1. Engage in pursuit after the robbery had happened to retrieve property?
2. Start a gunfight at car-length distances with a pokcet-pistol that holds 5 shots when the other car had four men in it?
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Ha ha, wow. The intent was good -- the methods not so much.

1: It's not your property -- not your problem. If you, say, caught a robber in the process of actually stealing somebody's property, and you could easily overcome him without fear of injury to either yourself or bystanders, there's no reason not to. But, in that situation, he had no idea what he was up against and he engaged in several actions that could have caused the death of either himself or any of the four men in the other car. Not real bright.

2: I don't care about car-length distances or pocket pistols. He shouldn't have started a gunfight at all. There's no reason you ever need to start a gunfight. Jewelry is worth no one's life, not even the robbers.

The only reason I would ever intervene in a robbery would be if either it was apparent that I could easily overpower said robber, or if the lives of anyone in the vicinity of said robber appeared to be in jeopardy because of his actions.
 
The only reason I would ever intervene in a robbery would be if either it was apparent that I could easily overpower said robber
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freakgas, maybe he thought what you said above. he only had some moments to make a decision.

its his life and he figured I'm going to do something about this. did his action lead to the robbers' apprehension?

I am not even going to ask if he was charged because I know he wasn't.

also, WAG, you made some good points but money isn't everything. there are people who can afford the legal bill. whether homeless or a millionaire, it should be legal or not. we all know that isn't always the case.
 
flyboyjake said:
The use, attempt, or offer to use force upon or toward the person of another is not unlawful in the following cases:
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It would have been helpful, Flyboy, if you had provided a source for the material you quoted in this post.

Even without that, however, it's worth noting that there is a major difference between "use of force," as justified in the paragraphs you quoted, and "use of deadly force," which generally has much stricter requirements for justification.

As JohnKSa and stephen426 noted: "intentionally ramming an occupied vehicle would qualify as assault with a deadly weapon."

So Mr. Thalheimer's initial action, ramming the robbers' car, already involved the use of deadly force -- which is not justified by anything in the passage you quoted.
 
There's a robbery. They are getting away. I can stop them. Ha! Retreat! Oops, I can't. Oh crap. Front sight, press. Oh crap, again. Front sight, press. Retreat!

That's likely the thought process, processed immediately, under stress, following an adrenaline dump and operating under a collapsing time frame.

And things like that cause folks to make decisions which, with the benefit of hindsight, are often determined to be poorly "thought" out decisions. Its why LEOs are held to a standard which considers what is reasonable and necessary as perceived at the moment of the action, taking into account knowledge, training and ability. Applying that standard here? Sure, mistakes were made. But I can understand the impulse to act.

Erik - Who would advised folks, should they find themselves in similar circumstances, to not go on the offensive and to serve as good witnesses.

--

Note: It is an assumption to assert that he missed with his shots, the first shot in particular.
 
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Interesting about snubbies and IPSC/IDPA has training. In the recent IDPA magazine a letter asked about more realistic rules and matches for pocket guns. The answer was that IDPA was a game and not for training. That says it.

They also said you can shoot IDPA with a snubby. I have. Claude Werner who teaches a great snubby class has. So it gives you trigger time with the gun. Don't expect to win - but that's a gamer attitude anyway.

It's certainly not a tactical training experience. It's a trigger time experience - which is certainly useful.
 
Technically, since the robbery was over and the robbers were not threatening anyone at the time, rammng the get away car could be considered assault.
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I am surprised at the some of the comments about whether or not force to stop the suspects in this case by a private citizen are justified or not. Grand juries are not inclined to indict people trying to stop violent felony criminals unless it is obviously unreasonable for the circumstances. This was not a shoplifter at Wal-mart. Masked men sticking a gun in someone's face in a parking lot is a high level felony and the action of ramming the getaway car thereby stopping its mobility doesn't even come close to being unreasonable in the eyes of the law (at least not here in Texas where I am at). Now, when one of the suspects jumped out and pointed a gun at him, he had every right to defend himself which he did. His initial action of ramming the car was an attempt to stop armed felony suspects and did not amount to deadly force. However, this action did set a series of events in motion that could have caused a tragedy and I agree that it was very fortunate that no innocents were injured or killed.

Debating the tactics are very appropriate here but I have to say that I think the guy is a warrior at heart, not motivated by any hero syndrome, and is probably guided by conscience to do what needs to be done to thwart the escape of violent fleeing felons.
 
So it gives you trigger time with the gun. Don't expect to win - but that's a gamer attitude anyway.

It's certainly not a tactical training experience. It's a trigger time experience - which is certainly useful.
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When I did shoot competition, I usually finished middle of the pack. I shot too 'tactically' to win against the gamers.
 
Masked men sticking a gun in someone's face in a parking lot is a high level felony and the action of ramming the getaway car thereby stopping its mobility doesn't even come close to being unreasonable in the eyes of the law...
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Had he witnessed the crime he might have been able to use that as justification for his actions. The problem is that by his own admission he did not witness the crime.

He rammed the car after he became suspicious because he saw masked persons in a car speeding through the parking lot.
His initial action of ramming the car was an attempt to stop armed felony suspects and did not amount to deadly force.
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1. He had no knowledge tht the persons in the car were armed.
2. He did not know that they had committed a felony, he merely became suspicious because of their appearance and actions.
3. Deadly force is deadly force even when it's justified. You can argue that what he did was justified--although there's not much evidence to support that argument--but there's no doubt at all that what he did amounted to deadly force.
...probably guided by conscience to do what needs to be done to thwart the escape of violent fleeing felons.
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Again, he didn't know they were violent because he didn't witness the crime nor did he know that they were felons, nor did he know that they were fleeing. All he knew was that he saw masked persons in a car driving fast. He assumed they were criminals leaving the scene of a crime but they could have been on their way to a crime or they might have been some stupid kids on their way to pull a prank or leaving the scene of a prank they had already pulled.

The only way to sum this up is that he used impressively bad judgement and that he's very, VERY lucky that he guessed right (that they were, in fact criminals and not stupid kids playing a prank), that no one was hurt and that for whatever reason the local authorities decided not to try to prosecute him.
 
Interesting about snubbies and IPSC/IDPA has training. In the recent IDPA magazine a letter asked about more realistic rules and matches for pocket guns. The answer was that IDPA was a game and not for training. That says it.

They also said you can shoot IDPA with a snubby. I have. Claude Werner who teaches a great snubby class has. So it gives you trigger time with the gun. Don't expect to win - but that's a gamer attitude anyway.

It's certainly not a tactical training experience. It's a trigger time experience - which is certainly useful.
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Glenn, 'Always cheat, always win' and that ain't a gamer rule!

But except for BUG matches I don't think IDPA allows the use of 5 shot snubs.

What I do is this.

I have a Dillon SDB in .38 spl and yes a 640 (.357 5 shooter) as a dedicated practice gun. I shoot it quite often. I also have a .22 Smith 63, 2 inch, as an understudy.

Add to that both a 'red' ASP J .38 and an aluminum J 38 (used to make holsters with.) When doing bag work at the gym the guy lets me were the holsters under my t-shirt and practice H2H and drawing at the same time (there is forest of bags and no one else there when I practice.)

And Yep, my Glock 26 has a setup almost like that (but with a AACK .22 unit.)

But then I am serious with my snubs!

Deaf
 
Insurance?

Does the insurance industry have any bearing on our tactics or our training? Should it?

I apologize for introducing the insurance question into a strictly Tactics and Training forum, but since the "the stolen goods are covered by insurance" argument has been mentioned, and the spectre of legal bills for defending Mr. Thalmeier against civil or criminal charges, and the question of the damage to his pickup truck have all been raised, I wondered:

If Mr. Thalmeier's insurance for Loss by Theft for his store, Automobile Comp, Collision and Liability and his personal Liability insurance policies are carried by the same company, are his policies being reviewed for cancellation or re-pricing?

What does his insurance adjuster or agent say about these actions.

Should we take our insurance into account when planning our tactics or taking our training?

If not, should we even mention it in these threads?

Lost Sheep
 
Mr. Barley,

My comment is specifically referring to the pursuit of a felon, not the use of deadly force, hence the analogy with pursuing reckless drivers. I get the feeling that in very misguided attempts to sound level-headed, some posters on here would not advocate any action other than no-action. That was the point of my earlier comment about the dangers of crooks getting used to the victim doing nothing and its emboldening effect. I've been LE and private security, and the expectation is for us to act SOMEHOW.

It is easy to preach on the Internet, and my point is simply that while some people "chest-pound" to sound like bad ***es, the opposite is also true. Some just preach to appear more righteous-than-thou by criticizing and over-analyzing every incident they can find.
 
Some folks are scrappier than others... time will tell exactly what it's going to cost him. At the least he convinced some robbers that not everybody is sheep.
 
1) The bad guy gets a vote in the fight, never forget/discount that fact.
2) The IDPA/IPSC/Whatever guy was dumb, period.
3) Paul Howe @ CSAT has amassed a collection of anecdotal examples of LE personnel hurt/killed from reverting to habits picked up playing gun games. They're not training, they're F**KING GAMES WITH BULLETS.
4) The IDPA/IPSC/Whatever guy was dumb.
 
Wow he didn't jump out into the weaver stance, focus on the front sight and his breathing, trigger squeeze, trigger reset... Real world aint the range and paper target bulleyes!
 
Micahweeks brings up a valid point: if many of the opinions expressed here are honest, and not sugarcoated to placate the anti-gun crowd or the (generally) ignorant public, then I have concern that many here would be better advised to leave their weapons in the safe. If the worst happens and you over-analyze instead of acting, then you lose. Or someone you could have protected loses. This does not mean I advocate gunning down some kid stealing a CD from the local Wal-Mart, but when you choose to carry a weapon then you take on responsibilities. Some of these are law, and some are unwritten, but they are responsibilities nonetheless.
 
IDPA/IPSC is not 'training'. They are games played with guns.
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Individual training tasks performed during gun games off the top of my head:

1. Load weapon.
2. Draw weapon and engage target/s.
-static
-dynamic
-various ranges
-percentage shots
3. Engage target with strong hand.
4. Engage target with weak hand.
5. Emergency mag change.
6. "Tactical" mag change.
7. Reduce stoppage.
-immediate action
-remedial action
8. Engage target from covered position.
9. Engage target from alternate firing position.
10. Unload weapon.
11. Clear weapon.

The tasks above are included in EVERY decent shooting curriculum offered by ANY competent course of instruction, and are similar to the tasks I trained and used in places like Panama, Afghanistan, and Iraq to clear compounds and buildings of bad dudes.

Amazingly enough, the individual and collective (that means team / more than one for those unfamiliar with training terms) live fire courses of fire used in military and LEO training, resembles courses of fire used in "gun games". Go figure.

A shooter can be as "tacticool" or as "gamey" as they want while shooting a gun game, as long as they are safe, and to say that there is no training value derived from "gun games" is just plain ignorant. PERIOD.
 
If the worst happens and you over-analyze instead of acting, then you lose.
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Under-analyze and/or acting too soon, then you can lose just as easily.

The point we should all be taking is that the man over-reacted and is likely going to pay very dearly for his actions.
 
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