He would simply look for “prey”, and then look for who was paying attention to the “prey”. In short, he had to think like a criminal.
Who’s paying attention to the prey?
Friday, October 18th, 2019The CIA paid $240,000 to buy the world’s entire supply of LSD
Saturday, September 28th, 2019
In the early 1950s, he arranged for the CIA to pay $240,000 to buy the world’s entire supply of LSD. He brought this to the United States, and he began spreading it around to hospitals, clinics, prisons and other institutions, asking them, through bogus foundations, to carry out research projects and find out what LSD was, how people reacted to it and how it might be able to be used as a tool for mind control.
Now, the people who volunteered for these experiments and began taking LSD, in many cases, found it very pleasurable. They told their friends about it. Who were those people? Ken Kesey, the author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, got his LSD in an experiment sponsored by the CIA by MK-ULTRA, by Sidney Gottlieb. So did Robert Hunter, the lyricist for the Grateful Dead, which went on to become a great purveyor of LSD culture. Allen Ginsberg, the poet who preached the value of the great personal adventure of using LSD, got his first LSD from Sidney Gottlieb. Although, of course, he never knew that name.
Nobody needs more than seven rounds for self defense
Friday, September 27th, 2019The New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act of 2013 restricted the sale of normal-capacity magazines; it only allowed seven rounds of capacity. Older magazines were “grandfathered” in, but you weren’t supposed to load them with more than seven rounds.
Chris Hernandez noted at the time that nobody needs more than seven rounds for self defense:
After all, when you shoot someone even once, they fly through the air and drop dead, just like in the movies.
I arrived on a robbery call one night. A robber had shot a man through the sternum with a 9mm hollow point. He looked dead. I got on the radio and notified dispatch that we had a murder. Thirty seconds later, the victim started moaning and squirming. Less than a minute later he was fully conscious and complained, “This is the fifth time I’ve been shot.”
But nobody needs more than seven rounds. One round is usually fatal. And nobody could possibly still be a threat after being shot more than once.
The same robbers shot another victim that night. One round in the ankle, one in the face and one in the forehead. 9mm hollow points. This victim turned and ran about 500 yards through an apartment complex, pounded on a door to beg for help, and passed out. Last I heard, years after the shooting, he’s still alive.
But nobody needs more than seven rounds. When you shoot someone, they fall to their knees, pledge their soul to Jesus, gasp dramatically and die.
I answered a disturbance call one night. A teenage girl calmly told me that she had gotten into a fight with her ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend. Several minutes into the story she informed me she had been shot through the thigh. I looked down and saw a bullet wound through her leg. She was completely unconcerned about it.
I responded to a burglary in progress. A teenager on PCP picked a random house and started kicking the sun room door in. The homeowner stood by the door with his 9mm pistol, called 911 and warned the teenager he was armed. The teenager kicked the door in. The homeowner shot him in the leg, then retreated into the house. The teenager forced his way into the kitchen. The homeowner shot him in the stomach. When we arrived, we had to wrestle the teenager into handcuffs. Had the teenager been armed, he still could have fired a weapon.
But nobody needs more than seven rounds. Seven rounds are more than enough to stop any criminal threatening you. When a criminal gets shot, their body’s entire blood supply sprays onto all the walls and they die within milliseconds.
I answered a call about a man with a gun. When I knocked on an apartment door, a drunk inside pointed a gun at me through a window. I jumped out of the way, drew my weapon and screamed at the drunk to drop the gun. He kept moving the gun, trying to get me in his sights. Another officer in a different spot shot him.
When we got inside the apartment, we found the suspect wide awake, flailing around on the floor. Fortunately a family member had disarmed him. He could still have shot us. The officer had hit him under the left arm. The round went all the way through his upper body and stopped just under the skin below his right arm. Last I heard, years after the shooting, the drunk was still alive.
But nobody needs more than seven rounds. When someone is trying to kill you, all you have to do is fire slowly and carefully to make sure you don’t run out. You can even count your rounds as you shoot. It’s easy.
When investigators asked the officer who saved my life how many rounds he fired, he said, “Two or three, I think.” But when they counted rounds in his magazine, it turned out he had fired eight. He had been a cop for over twenty years, and was a survivor of several shootings. Under stress, he lost count of his rounds. Because that’s what happens when you’re shooting to save your life, or to save someone else’s life.
But nobody needs more than seven rounds. You can just shoot the bad guy in the head. It’s easy to make a head shot under stress, right? And they’re immediately fatal.
I answered a stabbing call at a nightclub. When I arrived I found two women standing at the open door of a truck, telling the driver, “You’ll be okay.” When I shined my flashlight on the driver, I was stunned; he hadn’t been stabbed, he had been shot in the head with a .38 from close range. About a third of his skull was blown away. And he wasn’t just alive, he was awake. He nodded to the women, wiped his face, did his best to stay calm. When paramedics arrived, the man got out of the truck with minimal assistance. He died hours later.
I arrived on a shooting/riot outside a club. One man was dead in the street, another had been taken to the hospital by private car. As we tried to control the crowd, a severely beaten young man walked up to me and slurred, “Hey man, we need an ambulance.” I answered, “Yeah, we have one on the way.” As I spoke, I noticed a bloody dent on the side of the young man’s head. I thought, Is that a bullet hole? The man collapsed at my feet. A 9mm Black Talon hollow point had bounced off his skull. The wound didn’t put the man down until several minutes after he was shot. He survived.
I assisted on a rollover accident. The driver was an older woman who lost control of her truck. At the emergency room, a CAT scan revealed a bullet in her head. The woman died. Her husband was unconscious. Days later, when the husband awakened, investigators asked who shot his wife. The man answered, “Oh yeah, that. She told me she got shot in the head about ten years ago, before we got married. She never went to the doctor or nothing, though.” An autopsy showed it was an old wound. This woman got shot in the head, and never even bothered to get medical attention.
But nobody needs more than seven rounds. If little bullets don’t work, get a pistol that fires bigger bullets. Nobody could still be a threat after being hit by a big round.
In one of our firefights in Afghanistan, three French Marines were hit by gunfire. One died from a head wound. The other two were hit in the upper body and badly wounded. Those two Marines got back to their feet, kept their weapons ready and made it to safety with help. And they were hit by either 7.62×39 AK-47 rounds or 7.62x54R PKM machine gun rounds. Those are far more powerful than what any typical pistol fires.
These stories are all from my personal experience. Secondhand, I know of a man who was shot in the forehead, sneezed and blew the round out his nose. I know of a gang member who had half his head blown off by an AK round, then told the first responding officer, “They shot me, dog.” I know of a robber who ran into a restaurant with an Uzi and was immediately shot twice by an off-duty officer, then ran to a payphone and called 911 to report he had been shot.
Historically speaking, I know of the suspect in the Miami FBI shootout who sustained a non-survivable wound in the first few seconds of the fight, but still managed to kill two FBI agents and wound several others. I know of a drunk suspect who shot an Arkansas deputy twice, then took seventeen 9mm rounds in the torso without effect before the deputy finally shot him twice in the face. I know of the young Georgia mother who shot a burglar five times in the head and neck. He asked her to stop shooting, cried, and drove away. I know of many Soldiers and Marines who sustained horrible wounds and stayed in the fight.
It is not the seller and so can’t be responsible
Sunday, August 25th, 2019Amazon has shifted from something like a big-box store to something much more like a flea market:
A Wall Street Journal investigation found 4,152 items for sale on Amazon.com Inc. ’s site that have been declared unsafe by federal agencies, are deceptively labeled or are banned by federal regulators — items that big-box retailers’ policies would bar from their shelves. Among those items, at least 2,000 listings for toys and medications lacked warnings about health risks to children.
The Journal identified at least 157 items for sale that Amazon had said it banned, including sleeping mats the Food and Drug Administration warns can suffocate infants. The Journal commissioned tests of 10 children’s products it bought on Amazon, many promoted as “Amazon’s Choice.” Four failed tests based on federal safety standards, according to the testing company, including one with lead levels that exceeded federal limits.
Of the 4,152 products the Journal identified, 46% were listed as shipping from Amazon warehouses.
[...]
Amazon’s common legal defense in safety disputes over third-party sales is that it is not the seller and so can’t be responsible under state statutes that let consumers sue retailers. Amazon also says that, as a provider of an online forum, it is protected by the law — Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 — that shields internet platforms from liability for what others post there.
[...]
Third-party sellers are crucial to Amazon because their sales have exploded — to nearly 60% of physical merchandise sales in 2018 from 30% a decade ago, Amazon says. The site had 2.5 million merchants with items for sale at the end of 2018, estimates e-commerce-intelligence firm Marketplace Pulse.
Amazon doesn’t make it easy for customers to see that many products aren’t sold by the company. Many third-party items the Journal examined were listed as Amazon Prime eligible and sold through the Fulfillment by Amazon program, which generally ships items from Amazon warehouses in Amazon-branded boxes. The actual seller’s name appeared only in small print on the listing page.
[...]
In contrast, Walmart Inc. requires all products on store shelves be tested at approved labs, company documents show. Target says it requires suppliers of store-branded products to undergo additional inspections and testing beyond government standards.
Target and Walmart have created online marketplaces for third parties to sell directly to consumers. Target’s site, launched earlier this year with several sellers, is invitation-only. Walmart had around 22,000 sellers at the end of 2018, according to Marketplace Pulse. It requires an application that can take days for approval, and only a fraction of merchants applying make it through the vetting, says a person familiar with Walmart’s policy.
Less than 1% of the city’s population accounted for more than half of its lethal incidents
Saturday, August 24th, 2019Since Sept. 11, 2001, hundreds of Americans have died in terrorist attacks and mass shootings — while more than 100,000 have died from common street violence:
Urban violence accounts for most murders in the U.S., but politicians focus on everything except the violence itself, instead issuing sweeping calls to ban guns, legalize drugs or end poverty.
In a 2016 paper, my colleague Christopher Winship and I analyzed reviews of more than 1,400 studies on anti-violence programs around the world. We discovered that urban violence is sticky, meaning that it tends to cluster among a surprisingly small number of people and places. In New Orleans, for instance, a tiny network of less than 1% of the city’s population accounted for more than half of its lethal incidents between Jan. 1, 2010, and March 31, 2014. In Boston, more than 70% of all shootings between 1980 and 2008 were concentrated in less than 5% of the city’s geography. In almost every city, a few “hot people” and “hot spots” are responsible for the vast majority of deadly violence; the key to addressing the problem is to pay close attention to them.
I don’t think we’re supposed to look too carefully at these hot people and spots.
The biggest Epstein conspiracy mystery is not how he died
Friday, August 16th, 2019The biggest Epstein conspiracy mystery is not how he died, Steve Hsu explains:
The more important mystery is how he managed to operate out in the open for 15-20 years. Rumors concerning Epstein and leading figures like Bill Clinton have been around for at least that long. I have been following his activities, at least casually, via mostly non-mainstream media sources, for well over a decade.
In the 1990s I was a Bill Clinton supporter. I voted for him twice and supported his efforts to move the democratic party in a centrist, pro-business direction. But my brother is a Republican. He fed me a steady stream of anti-Clinton information that I (at the time) dismissed as crazy right-wing conspiracy theories. However, with the advent of the internet in the late 90s it became easier to obtain information that was not filtered by corrupt mainstream media outlets. I gradually realized that at least some of my brother’s claims were correct. For example, Clinton’s first presidential bid was almost derailed by charges of adultery by women like Gennifer Flowers. Supporters like myself dismissed these charges as a right-wing smear. However, years later, Clinton admitted under oath that he had indeed had sex with Flowers.
I believe my first exposure to Hillary Clinton was her appearance on 60 Minutes after the SuperBowl in 1992. This was widely regarded to be the emotive performance (“stand by your man”) that saved Bill Clinton’s presidential candidacy. Hillary affects a fake southern accent and (I believe) lies boldly and convincingly about Flowers to an estimated 50 million Americans. Quite a display of talent.
A side-effect of my history as a Clinton supporter (and gradual enlightenment thanks for my brother!) is that I became quite interested in the tendency of the media to hide obvious truths from the general public. We Americans accept that foreign governments (e.g., the Soviets and “ChiComs”) successfully brainwash their people to believe all sorts of crazy and false things. But we can’t accept that the same might be true here. (The big difference is that people in PRC — especially intellectuals — know they are being deceived, whereas most Americans do not…)
It was natural for me to become aware of Epstein once he was linked to Bill Clinton at the very birth of the Clinton Foundation. For someone with even a slight interest (let alone an actual journalist), it was easy to uncover very disturbing aspects of the Epstein story — including details of his private island, traffic in young women, connections to the rich, the powerful, and even to leading scientists, academics, (many of whom I know) and Harvard University.
But just 6 months ago I could mention Epstein to highly educated “politically aware” acquaintances with absolutely no recognition on their part.
Stack your attackers
Monday, August 12th, 2019About 40% of violent criminal attacks involve more than one attacker, Greg Ellifritz warns:
I’m seeing lots of recent news articles where groups of teens attack individuals and couples. The teens often beat the victims into unconsciousness. Take a look at these news articles that have been posted in the last couple weeks.
- Columbus police looking for teen girls involved in Schiller Park attack
- Girl Seen on Video Being Brutally Attacked by Group
- Group attacks bouncer, security at Pacific Beach restaurant
- Brutal beating where man is stomped repeatedly in Jersey City is caught on video
- Video shows police employee viciously beaten in Baltimore street
- DC Tourist Savagely Beaten, Stomped, Spit on by Gang of Youths at Hilton Hotel
All of these events involved groups of three to eight criminals attacking a single person or a couple. These group attacks seem to be increasing in frequency.
His advice:
- The best way to win the fight is to avoid it.
- Multiple attackers are more dangerous to you.
- Whenever possible, try to “stack” your attackers.
- If you end up grappling with one of your attackers, use him as a shield to keep between you and the other attackers.
- Chokes are important.
- Don’t go to the ground.
- If you can’t escape, stack your attackers, or manipulate one to be a shield, you must attack.
The suspects had a history of threats or other troubling communications
Tuesday, August 6th, 2019So, what role does mental illness play in these mass killings?
Multiple studies done between 2000 and 2015 suggest that about a third of mass killers have an untreated severe mental illness. If mental illness is defined more broadly, the percentage is higher. In 2018 the Federal Bureau of Investigation released a report titled “A Study of the Pre-Attack Behavior of Active Shooters in the United States Between 2008 and 2013.” It reported that 40% of the shooters had received a psychiatric diagnosis, and 70% had “mental health stressors” or “mental health concerning behaviors” before the attack.
Most recently, in July 2019, the U.S. Secret Service released its report “Mass Attacks in Public Spaces—2018.” The report covered 27 attacks that resulted in 91 deaths and 107 injuries. The investigators found that 67% of the suspects displayed symptoms of mental illness or emotional disturbance. In 93% of the incidents, the authorities found that the suspects had a history of threats or other troubling communications. The results were similar to those of another study published by the Secret Service on 28 such attacks in 2017.
[...]
It should be emphasized that mentally ill patients who are receiving treatment are no more at risk for violence than the general population. Yet it is also clear that without treatment some seriously mentally ill people are at greater risk for violent behavior than the general population.
It doesn’t seem like we take mere threats very seriously.
You don’t control all the variables
Friday, July 26th, 2019Trying to figure out why a criminal chooses to commit a crime can be a bit tricky at times, Greg Ellifritz reminds us:
I had been called to a nursing home on the complaint that a homeless man was sitting outside being argumentative with staff and residents. The nursing home staff didn’t want charges filed against the guy. They just wanted me to get him to leave.
I found the man sitting on a bench right in front of the nursing home entrance. I approached him, introduced myself, and explained the reason why I was there. He told me that he was homeless and stayed at a local shelter. He had a bus pass, so I offered to give him a ride to the nearest bus stop so that he could get “home.”
The interaction couldn’t have gone better. I was nice and polite. He was nice and polite. He understood why the nursing home didn’t want him there. I wasn’t going to arrest him. I asked him where he wanted to go and was in the process of taking him there. There was absolutely no motivation for him to attack me.
Yet he did. He extended his hand to shake and when I took it, he shot in for a double leg take down. I sprawled, took his back, and got him cuffed in just a few seconds. As soon as I got his arms behind his back, he stopped fighting and apologized.
If I recall correctly, he was in his mid-40s (a few years older than me at the time). He was really tall, but very skinny and undernourished looking. No past criminal record other than some minor convictions for trespassing and disorderly conduct. He wasn’t on any drugs.
He was just crazy. The voices in his head told him to do it. After I arrested him, he was calm and polite again. He couldn’t tell me why he had tried to take me down. It was almost like he suffered from extremely poor impulse control. He had a strange thought and he just suddenly had to act on it. No rhyme or reason.
Another anecdote:
I was once dispatched to a traffic crash in the early afternoon. After I arrived on scene, I quickly determined that the person who caused the crash was incredibly intoxicated. He was a tiny (103 lbs) male in his 20s and drunk out of his mind (later tested at .229). As I was handcuffing him, I asked him a question:
“Do you have any weapons on you?”
Nods head yes
“What do you have, a gun?”
Nods head yes
“Where is it?”
He says “right here!” and rapidly goes for his waistband.
Greg smash. To the ground we go. I land on top of him, get control of his hands and cuff him. After he’s cuffed, I search him. No gun.
“Why did you say you had a gun?”
Laughs. “Cuz I’m a fuckup”
Another:
About a year ago, I responded to a very chaotic call. A college-age male was playing basketball with his friends on a junior high school playground. His friends reported that he sort of “spaced out” and then suddenly ripped off his shorts and shirt. Clad only in his boxer shorts and shoes, he ran away from his friends at full speed. The friends were puzzled by his actions and started following the nearly naked man.
He ran to a neighborhood across the street from the school. He walked up to the front door of a house and kicked it in. He entered the house and began tearing up all of the furniture and destroying all the art in the house. He did not know the owner of the home and seemingly chose the house randomly. In less than five minutes he caused almost $30,000 in damage and ended up cutting himself pretty badly.
He walked out of the house, took his shoes off, and ran back to the school. There was a girls’ lacrosse game going on. The man ran directly onto the lacrosse field and tried to take lacrosse sticks from a few of the girls. An athletic trainer saw this bleeding man wearing only underwear and appearing disoriented. The trainer approached the bleeding man and asked if he needed medical attention. The man punched the female trainer in the face.
By now, the fans watching the game noticed what was happening. Several of the girls’ fathers chased the man down and tackled him. They held him down until we arrived. It took several cops to get him under some semblance of control and into the back of the police car. He banged his head on the plastic screen that separates the back seat of the cruiser from the driver for almost the entire drive from the scene to the jail.
When he arrived at the station he punched an officer and it took four of us to get him controlled and buckled in to a restraint chair. He soon became almost catatonic. We summoned the medics to come check him out. Blood pressure and heart rate normal. No difficulty breathing. No wounds deep enough to need stitches. He got a clean bill of health.
So why did he destroy a house, attack an athletic trainer, and punch a cop?
We don’t know. About an hour into the arrest, the suspect became fully coherent. He didn’t remember any facet of the incident. He said that he had consumed some “magic mushrooms” and shortly thereafter started acting irrationally. He said he did the mushrooms regularly and that he took the same dose that he always takes. He’s never done anything like this before.
I’ve been a cop for 24 years. My undergraduate degree is in natural resources management. I went to class every day in college with hippie “tree hugger” types who liked to smoke dope and eat mushrooms. I’ve also been to Burning Man five times. I’ve seen LOTS of people high on psychedelic mushrooms. None of those stoned people acted like this guy.
I suspect that he was either lying about what drugs he took, or that he had consumed some contaminated mushrooms. His behavior is more consistent with the behaviors of people doing synthetic cathinones (Spice, K-2, Bath Salts). He was displaying signs of excited delirium, not what I would expect from a person who has taken a “normal” dose of ‘shrooms.
Sometimes the drugs have a more indirect effect:
I asked him if he ever tried to get off the heroin. He said:
“No. I don’t want to get off of it. The drugs don’t even get me that high any more. I inject the heroin just to keep from getting sick. It doesn’t make me happy like it used to.”
“What I like is the adrenaline high from stealing things. I also like the adrenaline high I get from buying the dope without getting caught by the police. Those are my motivations; the drugs just keep me from getting sick. I just really like the thrill I get when I’m stealing things and the heroin ensures that I keep stealing. You can put me in jail, but I’ll start stealing and using again the first day I get out. I’ll never stop. I don’t want to stop”
What’s the point in telling all these stories?
The point is that the criminal who attacks you may have absolutely no motivation whatsoever for the attack. His motivations might also be altered by drugs or alcohol. He might just want the adrenaline spike he gets from committing the crime.
You might never really understand a particular criminal’s motivating drive. Unfortunately that lack of understanding doesn’t prevent the criminal from victimizing you. As I mentioned before, you don’t control all the variables. There are situations where no level of increased awareness, verbal judo, or “de-escalation” will prevent your victimization.
Rekognition misidentified darker-skinned women as men 31 percent of the time
Wednesday, July 24th, 2019Amazon’s Rekognition face-recognition software doesn’t always work that well, particularly on people of color:
An MIT study released earlier this year found that Rekognition misidentified darker-skinned women as men 31 percent of the time, yet made no mistakes for lighter-skinned men.
Have you confidence in me to trust me with your watch until tomorrow?
Sunday, July 7th, 2019
A debonair thief, Thompson had a knack for ingratiating himself with complete strangers on the street and then asking, “Have you confidence in me to trust me with your watch until tomorrow?” Many did, which cost them their expensive timepieces. The much-publicized trial and the odd crime at its heart piqued the interest of Herman Melville, who reworked it eight years later for his under-appreciated high-concept final novel, The Confidence-Man. After boarding a Mississippi steamboat on April Fool’s Day, its Mephistophelean titular character adopts a succession of guises with evocative backstories and surnames (Goodman, Truman, Noble) with the aim of getting one over on fellow passengers. Spurred by self-interest and reflective of society at large, the dupes place unquestioning trust in tokens such as attire and profession, making them as complicit in the con as the perpetrator. In The Adman’s Dilemma, which used literary and cultural waypoints to chart the evolution of the common snake-oil salesman into the modern man of advertising, Paul Rutherford bleakly described Melville’s novel as “a study in deception and even a self-deception so complete that there was no possibility of redemption”.
Let the enemy worry about his flanks
Wednesday, June 12th, 2019
There is a purpose to be served by this essay. The combination of modern medical science and the welfare state has brought about a condition of general overcrowding and boredom which, magnified by vast worldwide increases in population, has resulted in an unconscionable drop in personal safety. Before World War 2, one could stroll in the parks and streets of the city after dark with hardly any risk — at least no more than was involved in driving on the highway. A young woman needed no escort. One could safely ask for help on the road. Meeting with another rifleman in the woods was occasion for comradeship rather than a red alert. This is true no longer. Today, and for the foreseeable future, the problem of personal risk is much more serious than of yore. Our police do what they can, but they can’t protect us everywhere and all the time. All too often they cannot even protect themselves. Your physical safety is up to you, as it really always has been.
The principles herein enunciated are the result of a great deal of study and consultation, plus a fair amount of actual experience. Taken to heart, they may save your life. There is always an element of luck in any sort of conflict, and I know of no way to guarantee success in every instance. What I do know, however, is that if the victims of the dozen or more sickening atrocities that have gained nationwide fame in recent years had read this book, and had heeded what they read, they would have survived those actions. Additionally, a small but select number of goblins would not be alive today, bounding in and out of courts and costing us all money that could be much better spent.
George Patton told his officers, “Don’t worry about your flanks. Let the enemy worry about his flanks.” It is high time for society to stop worrying about the criminal, and to let the criminal start worrying about society. And by “society” I mean you.
May he never choose you, but, if he does, surprise him
Tuesday, June 11th, 2019
This is put last on purpose, for surprise is the first principle of offensive combat. However, the privilege of striking the first blow is a luxury we must usually grant to our attacker, so in a sense there can be no strategic surprise in defense. But that does not mean that the defender cannot achieve tactical surprise. By doing what our assailant least expects us to do, we may throw him completely off. As we have seen, what he usually least suspects is instant, violent counterattack, so the principle of aggressiveness is closely tied to threat of surprise.
One of the most hilarious episodes in recent cinema presents a bank teller debating the spelling of a written demand passed through the wicket by the bank robber. The whole affair shifts from banditry to an argument about whether the money can be handed over in the face of so badly constructed a missive. Pretty far-fetched, of course, but still stimulating. The unexpected is disconcerting. A disconcerted felon is momentarily less in charge of his own thoughts than the moment just before or just after. At that moment, his victim may be able to turn the tables.
On a realistic note, I can point out that in every single successful defense against violent attack that I know of — and I have studied this matter for nearly three decades — the attacker was totally surprised when his victim did not wilt. The speed, power, efficiency, and aggressiveness of the counterattack varied greatly, but the mere fact of its existence was the most elemental component of its success.
If you have friends in law enforcement, ask them to tell you the “April Fool” joke. It’s a bit gamy for a publication of this sort, but it makes a point — and it is very funny. Its moral is the moral of this manual: The criminal does not expect his prey to fight back. May he never choose you, but, if he does, surprise him.
Let your attacker worry about his life
Monday, June 10th, 2019
Anyone who willfully and maliciously attacks another without sufficient cause deserves no consideration. While both moral and legal precepts enjoin us against so-called “overreaction,” we are fully justified in valuing the life and person of an intended victim more highly than the life of a pernicious assailant The attacker must be stopped. At once and completely. Just who he is, why he has chosen to be a criminal, his social background, his ideological or psychological motivation, and the extent of injury he incurs as a result of his acts — these may all be considered at some future date. Now, your first concern is to stay alive. Let your attacker worry about his life. Don’t hold back. Strike no more after he is incapable of further action, but see that he is stopped. The law forbids you to take revenge, but it permits you to prevent. What you do to prevent further felonious assault, as long as the felon is still capable of action, is justified. So make sure, and do not be restrained by considerations of forbearance. They can get you killed. An armed man, especially if he is armed with a firearm, is dangerous as long as he is conscious. Take no chances. Put him out.
If you must use your hands, use them with all the strength you possess. Tapping your assailant half-heartedly, for fear of hurting him, will indeed make him mad, and since he has already shown that he is willing to kill you, he may try even harder now that you have struck him a painful though indecisive blow. If you choose to strike, by all means strike hard.
This also applies to shooting. If you are justified in shooting you are justified in killing, in all but a few quite obvious circumstances. Don’t try to be fancy. Shoot for the center of mass. The world is full of decent people. Criminals we can do without.
We often hear it said — especially by certain police spokesmen who, it seems to me, should know better — that in the event of victimization the victim should offer no resistance, for fear of arousing his assailant. Perhaps we should ignore the craven exhortation to cowardice made here. “Honor” may in truth be an obsolete word. So let us consider only results. The Sharon Tate party did not resist. The Starkweather victims did not resist. The La Biancas did not resist. Mitrione did not resist. The next time some “expert” tells me not to resist I may become abusive.
Apart from the odds that you will be killed anyway if you submit to threats of violence, it would seem — especially in today’s world of permissive atrocity — that it may be your social duty to resist. The law seems completely disinclined to discourage violent crime. The sociopath who attacks you has little to fear, at this writing, from either the police or the courts. The chief of police of our capital city has stated in print that, “The greatest real and immediate hazard that the hold-up man faces is the possibility that his victim may be armed and might shoot the criminal.” (US. News and World Report, 8 December 1969, page 35.) The syntax may be a bit garbled, but the meaning is clear. If violent crime is to be curbed, it is only the intended victim who can do it. The felon does not fear the police, and he fears neither judge nor jury. Therefore what he must be taught to fear is his victim. If a felon attacks you and lives, he will reasonably conclude that he can do it again. By submitting to him, you not only imperil your own life, but you jeopardize the lives of others. The first man who resisted Starkweather, after eleven murders, overcame him easily and without injury. If that man had been the first to be accosted, eleven innocent people would have been spared.
The coddling of murderers has brought us to an evil pass. If it is truly a wise and just policy (which we may have serious reason to doubt), leave it to the courts. When your life is in danger, forget it. If you find yourself under lethal attack don’t be kind. Be harsh. Be tough. Be ruthless.
You must keep your head
Sunday, June 9th, 2019
You must keep your head. If you “lose your cool” under deadly attack, you will probably not survive to make excuses. So don’t bother to improvise any… just keep your head. Anger, as long as it is controlled anger, is no obstacle to efficiency. Self-control is one thing the sociopath does not usually possess. Use yours to his undoing.
If you counterattack with your hands, use them carefully. (Remember that a blow with your closed fist to your enemy’s head will almost always wreck your hand. A finger in his eye is easier, safer, and likely to be more decisive.)
If you improvise a weapon from objects at hand, use it in a way most likely to do damage without loss or breakage. The points of most improvised weapons, from umbrellas to fire pokers, are usually more effective than the edges, as they can be applied with less warning and without exposure during a “windup.” A blunt point should be directed at the face or throat Drive it carefully, coolly, and hard.
The optimum defensive arm is the heavy-duty pistol, though a shotgun may surpass it for home defense if there is sufficient warning. If you are fortunate enough to have access to any sort of firearm when under attack, remember that it is only as good as your ability to keep cool and shoot carefully. My pupil, mentioned in Chapter Four, did not shoot carefully, and he survived largely through luck alone, for his attackers shot just as sloppily as he did. But we cannot count on miserable marksmanship in our enemies. The sociopath is indeed usually a bad shot, but not always, Clyde Barrow was quite good.
Another student of mine did far better. To begin with, he heard the approach of the assassins’ car in the cold grey light of dawn. He was alert even at that hour. He was on his feet immediately, pistol in hand. Through the blinds he saw two men coming rapidly up the walk to his door, one with a shotgun and one with a machine pistol. He decided that such a visit, with such equipment, at such an hour, needed no further explanation. He flung open the front door and went to work, and he remembered to remain cool and to shoot with precision. The two would-be murderers died in their tracks. The householder caught six pellets of bird shot in the leg. The attackers outnumbered and outgunned their proposed victim, but they were defeated and destroyed by a man who did everything right.
When an expensively trained police officer from one of the larger police departments misses a felon six times at a range of ten feet (and don’t think this doesn’t happen), his failure is not due to his technical inability to hit a target of that size at that distance, for he has demonstrated on the firing range that he can do so. His failure, and often his consequent death, is due to his lack of concentration upon his marksmanship — the loss of his cool.
The ability to remain cool under pressure comes more easily to some people than to others. But it is in no sense out of anyone’s reach. In fact it is the first qualification of a man that Kipling calls for in his immortal poem If. It is illustrated beautifully every time you see a quarterback calmly select and hit his receiver while under the threat of more than one thousand pounds of rock-hard, cat-quick muscle only a step away. It’s a matter of will. If you know that you can keep your head, and that you must keep your head, you probably will keep your head.
To train yourself to do this takes some thought. Certain kinds of athletics are excellent — football, of course, in particular. Sailing, flying, motor racing, and mountaineering are also good. But in my opinion the best of them all is the hunting of medium and big game. “Buck fever” is a classic affliction, and a man who has conquered it can be guaranteed to shoot carefully under pressure. While it is true that a deer is not shooting back, this is less significant than might at first appear. The deer is about to vanish, and, odd as it seems, fear of sporting failure is usually greater than the fear of death. This startling point is easy to prove. The average competitive pistol shot works and trains far harder to earn a little brass cup than the average policeman works and trains to acquire a skill that can save his life.
Not all hunters make the grade — the woods are full of ditherers in red jackets. But the really expert hunter/rifleman is a very good man to have on your side. Under any sort of attack, keep cool And if you must shoot, shoot with precision.