Up Close and personal with a Stun Gun or Pepper Spray

This is all part of the survival mindset, way of thinking. To survive a personal attack, you must already have the Survival Mindset. Now this is not some hocus pocus way of thinking. It is a way of life. It is really no different than planning a route as you drive to work or shopping. I hope you don't just drive blindly thru a "bad" neighborhood without realizing you could already be in deep trouble.

No of course not. If the bad neighborhood is between you and your destination, you plan a route around it. That is not living in fear or staying at home because it is too dangerous to go out side. It is having a Survival Mindset. Do you lock your home when you leave? I hope so! Then you already have a survival mindset! It may just need to be upgraded a little. Does carrying a stun gun seem out of place? Try it! If you keep on doing it, in spite of how awkward it seems at first, it will become as natural as wearing your clothes! Really!

I remember when I first became a certified Law Enforcement Officer. I was a Florida Park Ranger. I was a lot younger then and I thought it was so "cool" to be issued a gun and gun belt to go with my park uniform and green pick up truck. I was driving around the 5000 acre wilderness park in my 4 wheel drive Dodge Power Wagon, feeling like the Sheriff in Walking Tall. But if I went into town, it felt extremely strange to wear a gun in public! After a while, wearing a uniform with a gun became quite natural for me. Wearing a gun in plain clothes took a little more to get used to. It took a little longer, but when I thought of the consequences, such as seeing another officer who needed help or running into someone I had arrested, I found myself wearing it and it felt perfectly normal.

Taking a stun gun or pepper spray with you and getting used to having it should be, I believe, a normal everyday routine. It should be just as routine as getting dressed, shaving for the men or putting on makeup for the women. Get used to the idea that carrying the stun gun, especially the ones that look just like a cell phone, should become as natural as holding an umbrella over your head if it's raining. That's right! You do it to protect yourself!

Now that I have you protecting yourself with a non-lethal weapon, lets talk about carrying it and heaven forbid, being ready to use it. Now I have a concealed weapons permit. I have several handguns, a 38 snub nose revolver and a 40 cal S&W semi auto. But neither gun and especially the 40 cal S&W is just not real easy to carry in street clothes.

Twenty five years later, I would like to believe I am well passed the "self conscious" part. But, I am concerned that someone will notice it or the bulge in my clothes and it would frighten them into calling the police. During cooler weather, carrying a concealed handgun becomes much easier as we tend to wear clothes that do a good job of concealing a handgun. But that's the problem!

The more a weapon is concealed the more difficult it will be to get to it if it is ever needed! A weapon needs to be very readily accessible for use in a violent encounter. You just cannot walk to your car after work carrying a 357 magnum in your hand. Yet, if a bad guy was to ambush you and your gun is in your purse or under your coat in a holster on your belt, you may as well not have one at all.

Exactly the same with a non-lethal weapon. You must have it ready to use and defend yourself. If your weapon is in your glove box or in the bottom of your purse, it's almost useless. Yes, there are some ladies purses that are designed to carry a gun. And there are some men's jackets and vests that offer excellent concealment for a gun and still be ready for immediate use. We will cover those and techniques on how to use them tomorrow.

A weapon like a stun gun that looks like a cell phone is so valuable. You can carry the non lethal weapon without alarming anyone! No one is going to call the cops to report a crazed woman walking out of the mall with a cell phone in her hand! I like the cell phone stun gun, but some others are just as small and are just as effective.

There are stun guns that pack 100,000 volts of power. There are some very small stun guns that pack 2,700,000 volts! That's not a mis-print! 2.7 million volts! The more volts the shorter time you have to actually hold it against the bad guy. The small ones, 100,000 volts say to hold it on the bad guys 3-5 seconds! That takes too long! 800,000 volts you hold it on him for 2-3 seconds, The 2,700,000 volt model says just touch him! Don't worry the shock does NOT come back on you even if your bodies are touching.

A bad guy jumps you from behind, The weapon is already in your hand,

ZAP! You jab it into whatever body part is closest and down he goes in a heap, drooling like a baby with his eyes rolled back in his head. Now this is where the planning, the roll playing, the practice comes into full value. If you have never done it before, it will be hard to do under the stress of a violent encounter. Get with a partner and practice the whole thing repeatedly. NO, I don't mean stun your partner, just use any small harmless object and slowly at first, go thru the motions until you can do them automatically and without even pausing for a micro second to think about it. Practice hitting him in the neck, his side, his leg, his groin, whatever works for you.

This is life or death, survival. WOW, its just like any other routine!

For example: I was working my day off on an "off duty" detail on the 5th floor of the court house. Yep, I was one of those guys who made you empty your pockets into those little bowls before you walked thru the metal detector. A man came up and put his stuff in the bowl and set a large brief case on the table. As I started to open the brief case, he turned and as he went thru the metal detector the alarm sounded.

Now this was actually very common. Belt buckles, pens, thing people do not think about, set off the alarms. I instructed the man to back up so I could check him. As he backed up he reached into his open coat and I could see the grip of a hand gun. I reacted the way I had always planned I would. I grabbed the hand that was going for the gun, pulling that arm up high, my right hand grabbing his shoulder and spinning him around, all at the same time, I was going over the table that separated us. I kept the momentum going as I shoved him against the wall and pulled the gun from his belt. His gun went into my back pocket with my right hand and the handcuffs which I carried right behind my gun came up in my right hand cuffing his right hand that was firmly in the grip off my left hand. The guy's cuffed hand was brought down forcefully behind his back, then I grabbed his left hand and brought it down behind his back and finished cuffing him.

Wow, that was harder to write than it was to do it! All that was done in a very few seconds. Another officer, a corrections officer, from the jail, was sitting in a chair at the end of the table, she never moved! An attorney who I knew very well from too many court cases was right behind the guy with the gun. He turned white as sheet. I looked down to see what was hitting my knee, it was my other knee! My knees were knocking together! I shook that off and searched the guy to make sure I had all his weapons. The brief case contained $25,000 in cash. The guy refused to talk.

He was booked into the jail charged with carrying a concealed weapon, and carrying a weapon into a court house. I never did find out why he had all that money. The point of my story is:

I was prepared. I had trained for this, I had rehearsed such an incident in my mind over and over again. The mechanical movement came naturally to me when I needed to survive! When other officers heard about the arrest, they made statements like, " Oh, would have shot him or I would have drawn my gun and ordered him to put his hands up" etc. Well, if the scenario had played out just a micro second differently, I would have reacted differently, just as I had trained myself to do. If his hand had already been on the gun when I first saw it, then my reaction would have been different. If I was not already so close to him, my reaction would have been different. You too can survive dangerous situations. Plan for them. Practice for dangerous situations. Rehearse them in your mind or better yet, rehearse them with a partner.

Be prepared. Get a survival mindset. Get a stun gun, they are great!

Paul Foreman