Last June I was in my gun room , which is a 8' by 20' attachment to my non attached garage made out of 3/4" plywood plus siding and insulated and sheet rocked. I have a humongous safe which when the 2" thick door is swung open blocks the entrance if I open only half of the double entrance door (36"+36") . I was working at my bench on some project with the safe door open and the outside door partially open and the vent fan on the end of room near the bench on.
I had a friend up on my house doing some roofing repair with a helper about 75' away. My yard is fenced on the road and cross fenced for pastures and the driveway is 600' long. I have a Ridgeback/Mastif cross 125 pound dog- who stays on the property and bites strangers if they aren't cool! Listening to a talk show on a Saturday morning I begin to hear a soft voice holding a conversation . It sounded like it was about 50' away and I thought it was the roofer's helper talking to my friend on the roof . But the voice went on and on for about 1/2 hour and I begin to make out weird words and sentence structures. I moved to my safe near the door and listened with the radio and fan off and decided I didn't know who was talking but it sounded like a bizarre monologe!
I grabbed the closest loaded pistol that would conceal in my sweatshirt- a S&W 296 .44 special loaded with 180 grain XTP Hornady ammo . I closed the safe door partially and looked around the corner of outer door to find a long haired bearded, dirty bum about 30 or so leaning against the back of my garage and haveing a real evil sounding conversation with himself- about 10 feet awy!!
The gun imm. goes to low ready (2 hands and finger straight along trigger down under eye plane) and I challange the TRESSPASSER with : a strong " what are you doing here?"
The stranger starts approaching me with his hand extended, I yell: " Stay back, Stay back" and level the gun at his chest. He keeps coming and my finger goes to trigger and I tilt my head down on sights taking a back step and repeating the command to " Stay back" at the top of my voice.
He holds out his hand as if to shake hands and slowly advances oblivious of my gun and I continue to step back keeping about 8 feet from him (too stinkin close!!!!) . My friend the roofer, an old combat amigo of mine from VN and a bar brawlwer if there ever was one
yells down to me "is there a problem?" *(&^ yes I replied. Right then the guy begins retreating and suddenly his reddened crazed eyes focus on that big .44 muzzle with the cylinder that was beginning it's rotation as he kept coming! He starts saying with his hand out" I was at the party last night Bro, I just wanted to thank you" He was obviously still drunk/stoned from what ever/whereever the party was but I informed him clearly and while being covered that he was to leave right now and never come back!
My friend wanted to get in his face , but I restrained him (and my now present barking dog- who had been harrassing my goats or something in far pasture near the woods) and we escorted the troll to the county road and went back and called the sherrif. The sherrif came about 1/2 hour later (
) and I never heard if they contacted him or not.
Bottom line: no lawsuit, I felt safe and in control, I prolly was lucky my friend tilted the odds in my favor enough to wake a whacko up enough to back off the muzzle of a loaded , and ready to go off in a fraction of a second more .44!!!!
No lawsuits, no cops , no mess! If this would have happened inside my house I think it would have had a different outcome if I couldn't have retreated like I did outside!