Close to home

[Gordon]

I live in the sticks, total population of the county is 6000. Our sheriff's department is today investigating a home invasion that left a woman dead. Also got another door kick in burglary but the dwelling was unoccupied so no dead people. Think this only happens in the big city? Nope, coming soon to a neighborhood near you. True, most homes hereabouts have gun owning people living in them, but not all. Not all are prepared to react if the need arises. My home is my castle but a good castle is only as strong as the defenders. It is okay to sit around in your boxers if that is what you like to do at home, but keep an eye and an ear open and maybe something more than the remote control close at hand.

[610Alpha]

well said.

[Lowdown3]

A LEO I train with told me we had a rash of similar down our way a few months back. I don't remember it making the paper....

It helps to make contacts with local law enforcement, get a lot of "unpublished" type info that way :)

[Gordon]

Well, if there can be any good in this the thugs are in jail. An 18 year old and a 15 year old. Killed this woman (in her 80's) who had no means to defend herself. Just heard an interview on the radio with our sheriff (a good Christian man that I am proud to have served with when we were both younger on the same police department) and the interviewer asked him if people should get alarm systems and stronger locks. The sheriff's reply was basically that the same question came up at a church gathering and he told folks to get guns. That is why we keep re-electing him.

[KirkMcquest]

Sounds like a damn good sheriff! I always keep ol' betsy close to hand and loaded for just such an occasion. Breaking into people's homes is a gamble, sometimes you hit the jack-pot and sometimes you roll snake eyes.

[crossbow]

nothing like keeping one or like us, 2 good dogs around.Our labs don't let a snake crawl across the lawn without alerting us.

[ComputerGuy]

The thing I hate is we have some crime from mostly the city s*** some 15 miles down the road. The wife and I both carry, she a XD 9mm and myself the XD 40.

[Klayton]

The sign on the wall near the main entrance reads: "Friends Always Welcome, Relatives Please Call Ahead!"
LOL, but right below this sign is another sign that reads: "We are always watching you!"
The second watching you sign is by itself on the wall near the rear entrance. :)

[Christian for Israel]

i have my pistol on me 24/7 except when sleeping and in the shower. even then it's never more than 5 feet away.

[rockriver]

here's a story i heard out of south georgia.

http://www.walb.com/Global/story.asp?S=13528458

seems the robbers aren't doing too well in this instance.

[birdseye.2]

Such is the territory inherent when moving to the country. Crime happens at a much lower rate of occurrence, but it still happens. L.E. response time inside the cities can be as low as under 2 minutes. Even just outside of the city of San Diego where I worked, response time could be as long as 30 - 45 minutes. If you don't think that's enough time for someone to kill your two dogs, rape your wife or daughter, and then kill your entire family, while in the meantime having their buddies take everything of value in your house in two truck loads to a small lot three miles away, you're gravely mistaken. In instances such as this, will that one scared to death Deputy that was on duty flying your direction be enough to halt the situation until his backup, most likely a highway patrol officer, another thirty minutes away, shows up? Sound like that's way too much and could never happen? Think again. You've never heard of anything like this happening? Why would you? Who would ever want to speak of things like this?

Crimes like this don't happen unless someone has been casing your house and knows who you are, when you leave and return, what obstacles are in there way(such as, "Does the guy come outside every once in a while and fire off some rounds?" - he has guns) Hopefully your property has enough of a buffer zone that you know something is wrong if someone is around, but if not, always be aware. Someone casing a house; seeing that the occupant is scanning tree lines, watching cars, watching people, will be much less likely to continue casing a house. Men, if you leave your family at home alone, make sure your wife is ready and willing to use a weapon, even a .22 is enough to fend off an occurrence such as this in these times. In a time WROL, not likely, but now surely enough. When "intelligent" resistance is offered, it means more time, more noise, and just more of a pain in the ***. A vast majority of criminals are inherently lazy, or else they'd make an honest living.

Your number one defense isn't that weapon at your side; it's your situational awareness. If you had just seen that guy parked a couple of miles from your house down the road every other day for four weeks alternating days of the week for each week, maybe that wouldn't have happened. If you had just seen that guy trespassing on your neighbor’s property and responded, he would have never returned; AND that never would have happened. And last but definitely not least, if you or your wife had just had that gun, and when you heard your dogs barking, actually paid attention instead of ignoring it and watching the evening news, took your rifle to a vantage point, noticed the trouble, fired a couple warning shots... then that definitely WOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED.

We're all here for a reason, and most of us are hopefully beyond the point of naivety. There may be something to prepare for in the future, we are all aware of that. But are we all aware that there is something to prepare for every single second of every single day. The actions you take just ONE second in your life might affect the outcome of something that might happen sooner than you think.

[Klayton]

@birdseye... that made me think of that episode of "I should be dead"... The trapper rolled over his ATV and was crushed under it. He could not see anything for miles, until nightfall, he could dimly see what turned out to be a porch light. He commented every day he was trapped he noticed the rancher let out his dogs and they started barking like crazy (presumably from the trappers yelling for help) and yet the rancher NEVER investigated.

I am sorry, but we as humans all to often think are superior brains are better than our animals senses.
If my dogs are barking facing a specific direction, I may not investigate more than a quick visual the first time. But if they do the exact same again the next time they are out, well as the saying goes, "the game is afoot" and my family's survival may depend on me finding out what's going on.

I remember while on my grandfather's farm, my cousin and I found one of the horses dead (turned out dumb butt hunter mistakenly identified it as a deer and shot it). When my grandfather asked how we found him, we said the vultures were circling grandpa. How many city slickers would even think of that, let alone pay attention to several turkey vultures circling overhead?

SITUATIONAL AWARENESS

[Matt In Oklahoma]

@birdseye I used to be a cop and from midnight sat to 8am mon I was on my own except for backup from 26 miles and my buddy who had 283 sq miles in county was in the same boat. All I was was cleanup, it sucked