Carrying and Use of Knives

[Hanshi]

I'm no knife expert but I have friends who are. I've trained fairly extensively with knives and even still practice with them from time to time.

Generally I carry knives much more often than a handgun. A small 2" Ka-bar rides in a rigid sheath on my weak side and a Kershaw pocket knife on the right; plus I always have my cane with me.

Some things about knives. Knife wounds usually look uglier than bullet wounds; and they are potentially more lethal. Slashing & cutting are more easily defended in a court than stabbing, which is generally more lethal. A stabbing is assumed to be the result of a desire to kill; not good in court. Knives have a stigma that screams, MURDER, VIOLENCE, BARBARITY! Knife attacks simply look more violent. Of course if your life's on the line, going all out to defend yourself is the only option.

Never go to a knife fight with a knife! Go with a gun or at least a longer weapon than a blade. There is no such thing as a "fair fight"; there is only survival and death. However, if both you and your aggressor carry knives, DO expect to be CUT; maybe badly. This even if you have training and the aggressor doesn't know his butt from a hole in the ground. There's an old saying: any fool can pull a trigger. Okay, but any fool can swing a knife, as well. As I said, I'm not even close to being an expert; but I was a LEO for 9 years. And I've been training in the martial arts for more than 55 years. So go armed and may your God go with you.

 

[C0untZer0]

And may the Force of Carhartt be with you !

 

[jmr40]

I carry a knife to open boxes, dig splinters out of fingers, and cut other stuff as needed. I'd probably never think of using it in a SD situation. I carry a pistol for that.

 

[glistam]

I've always been way into knives and have easily over 100 in my collection. I've trained in knife fighting a little and I live in Maryland, where you can't get gun carry permits. We have a specific legal exemption for folding knives of any size, so it's one of few things one can be certain are legal to carry. I always have at least two knives on me at any given time, and bigger ones when I'm not at work. I also carry pepper spray, a metal pen, and a cane or stick anywhere I go.

That said, I've always had a "wary" view of knives as defensive weapons. They have limitations everyone needs to be aware of. They can scare, they can say "get off me" when grabbed, and they can kill outright. They don't do a good job of much else. Numerous cases I have read, both medical files and criminal cases, illustrate that non-fatal knife wounds are often not felt right away unless the wielder knows what they're doing, and fatal wounds have a delayed effect. You can mortally would someone with a knife and they can still kill you before they die. From a legal standpoint, a knife is generally considered deadly force. I've read a cluster of cases where a person with a knife was defending themselves against an unarmed assailant (who was the clear initiator of violence), and were convicted of second degree murder. The reason was they could have easily escape the scene. Another set of cases the knife wielder was determined to be innocent, because they had no reasonable method of escape and the assailant, though unarmed, still presented a potentially lethal threat do to what they were doing at the time.

I wholeheartedly agree that one should always avoid knife against knife. The one case I found on that had the result of both the attacker and defender being slashed and stabbed numerous times. The attacker died. The defender almost died. And luckily the courts found him innocent. But if I where him I would have certainly handled it differently.

 

[lemaymiami]

I always have a knife with me - and did just that during a career as a cop... Mostly it was for emergency purposes (and I did cut a few folks out of seatbelts with a blade when getting them out of a wreck was the first priority). That strong smell of gasoline, battery acid, and just plain fear is what I remember about bad crashes - not too many of them fortunately since I was a city cop... It was also a secondary, last ditch weapon that I was lucky enough never to really need.... but that's not something you can predict...

My Dad, a career Army type, did 28 years from WWII all the way through two tours in Vietnam (me, I did one short tour - 1971). When asked about knives he always said that the trouble with a knife is that you'll have to get too close to someone that really, really doesn't like you....

My experiences on the street with blades and the aftermath of too many cuttings or stabbings bore out his remarks. Frequently the individual cut or stabbed (whether victim or bad guy) never noticed the blade work until after the encounter - no matter how bad the wound(s). Folks foolish enough to actually fight with knives (blades on both sides of the argument) were going to need some serious doctor work, period. Witnesses to the various stabbings and cuttings I was at rarely ever even saw the knife involved - the most anyone saw was one person "punching" another...

Almost all of the knives we actually recovered after a wounding or killing were pure junk - not one fighting knife among them. If the incident occurred inside a home the knife most often involved came from the kitchen and might be anything from a flimsy steak knife (I was at one scene where an angry female stabbed another woman just once with a cheap, flimsy steak knife -it went right between the ribs on the side and into the victim's heart) to high quality butcher knives. We actually had one serial killer/rapist who invaded occupied homes late, late at night while everyone was asleep. His first task, as he crawled on his hands and knees was to go to the kitchen and find a butcher knife.... If anyone woke up during his foray he would attack the chest area in the dark - a real nightmare when you think about it....

Put simply a knife is a weapon - what will matter if there's a problem is exactly what was done with it in a confrontation. In some cases the guy with the knife might be clearly justified in others, if they're the aggressor they're going to need a lawyer - a good one....

And so it goes... Vonnegut

 

[bubba in ca]

SD laws vary in the extreme from state to state, in particular with regards to the "duty to retreat". What would be SD in one state would be murder in another. Know your laws, and hope for the best.
I use knives daily as tools and very much resent the restrictions in some legal jurisdictions that outlaw my behavior because I "might" use a tool as a weapon. I do have defensive knives in places where I would not leave a gun because of the grand kids, etc., but hope I would never have to use them as a weapon. In my view. defensive use of a knife is a desperation thing for when everything else has gone wrong-- you are on the ground, somebody is about to stomp you to death and your last chance is slash or stab somebody in the artery in the upper leg.

This guy ponders the issue along the lines of some of the comments above.
http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com/knifelies.html

 

[Smith357]

The knife is just a tool, a tool with which to cut things. Same as a gun, a gun is a tool to make holes from a distance. The weapon is between your ears.

 

[jeepnik]

As the man with the hammer said, "When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. You my friend look like a nail".

 

[Kookla]

I carry a knife every day. Those days I forget, I feel naked. Use mine for letter opening, tomato slicing, box cutting, more tomato slicing, chicken breast slicer, veggie slicer, ect. When I am bored and outside, I whittle.

Have been thinking as of late that I'd be better off just carrying a multitool, but none seem to have good blades that are easy to open. Best blade I've had so far on one is the victorinox swisstool, but it's a nail nick blade and I prefer one handers.

 

[JShirley]

I strongly disagree with any suggestion that a knife can/should be used to "scare" off a would-be attacker.

That's a good way to get killed. Brandishing a knife is even more dangerous and foolhardy than brandishing a gun.

 

[bikerdoc]

I believe in the Escalation therory we were taught in the academy 4 decades ago

They yell you use command voice
They use fists you use your baton
They present a knive or club, get distance and mace, or taze them
The end of the use of force spectrum is use your gun
no where is a knife mentioned
and if you do #1 right it ends there.

 

[glistam]

I strongly disagree with any suggestion that a knife can/should be used to "scare" off a would-be attacker.

That's a good way to get killed. Brandishing a knife is even more dangerous and foolhardy than brandishing a gun.

And yet here I stand, alive and well without an arrest record. 4 times.

However, I would never do it again and thus I still agree with you. Brandishing is one of those very stupid things that inexperienced people do. No one can deny that it works fairly often. Police aim their side arm at suspects and issue commands all the time, without firing. The news is filled with stories of scaring away assailants. And in one legal case In re Julianna B (2007) the defendant's lack of brandishing was actually used against her to convict her of murder.

The Court also finds that she could have easily used the knife as a deterrent, displayed it verbally, and told [the victim] to get away and scream for help, “Get out of here. I got a knife.”

However the news doesn't report on the cases where the attacker killed them anyway. They report on the murder of course, but the fact that the now dead victim brandished a knife prior is left out. I think it's important to make the distinction that brandishing without adequate cause is a crime, and brandishing without intent to kill is a foolish gamble. If a person draws any weapon, it should be will the full intention and understanding that it will be used.

 

[JShirley]

It's one of those things that could work, but that is more likely to backfire. A firearm is a distance weapon, and (though brandishing is a crime) can be used to "cover" a threat, and neutralize them should they continue aggressive action. Brandishing a knife can lead to the other party producing a gun and being potentially justified in shooting you dead.

John

 

[jeepnik]

I believe in the Escalation therory we were taught in the academy 4 decades ago

They yell you use command voice
They use fists you use your baton
They present a knive or club, get distance and mace, or taze them
The end of the use of force spectrum is use your gun
no where is a knife mentioned
and if you do #1 right it ends there.

Pretty much Kilvinsky's law rule #2.

 

[lemaymiami]

Let's hear it for Kilvinsky - and Joseph Wambaugh, the author... His first book was the push I needed all those years ago to take that civil service exam in 1973.. The rest is my fault entirely.

 

[bikerdoc]

I know not of this kilvinsky of whom you speak of.
I avoid cop written books for bucks. Especially Wambaugh.

If he was descibing an old sgt teaching at an academy full of viet nam vets the I would call it Sheehans rule
Rip Bill.

 

[Old Dog]

I believe in the Escalation therory we were taught in the academy 4 decades ago

They yell you use command voice
They use fists you use your baton
They present a knive or club, get distance and mace, or taze them
The end of the use of force spectrum is use your gun
no where is a knife mentioned
and if you do #1 right it ends there.

Well, things have changed. Most agencies' use-of-force policies will acknowledge that a knife is considered -- and defined in policy -- as a deadly weapon.

Most agencies' use-of-force continuums or use-of-force models permit the use of deadly physical force in response to how anything that can be used as a deadly weapon is being used, attempted to be used, or even simply threatened to be used.

It's no surprise that subject who present a knife in the presence of law enforcement officers typically end up getting shot. Especially since most of us have witnessed, over and over, failures of ECDs and OC.

Sorry, but I'm not bringing only my "command voice" to a knife fight ...

 

[bikerdoc]

Old dog,
I agree completely and Im not argueing. In fact most states now prohibit by statute the very tools I was issued, a baton (billy club) and a 10oz beaver tail sap.
It takes a special kind of stupid to pull a knife on an officer who can and probably will end your life.