San Diego, 2001, at about midnight, two thug-type young black men (20's maybe) shouldered my front door open, just hit it hard and cracked the deadbolt right out of the soft pine frame.
I was in bed, in a fifth floor apartment, no backdoor, caught like a rat in a trap. I didn't have a gun of any kind.
Thugs come into the bedroom, trying to be quiet I think, made me get up. They had black bandanas on their faces, black hoodies, and were armed with automatic pistols. It was dim in the room, I couldn't tell what make or caliber. I was staring down two barrels and at four crazy eyes, there wasn't much I could do.
One hit me with something, I never knew what, hard in the left temple, and I went down hard, time ceased to pass. When I woke up I was on the floor in the front room, my ankles were tied, my wrists were tied behind my back, and I was gagged.
The two thugs were digging through the apartment. After a time, one of them came back and put a pistol to the back of my neck, untied the gag and told me that if I yelled he'd kill me, and demanded that I tell him where to find the cash, jewelry, drugs, laptop computers, etc. I had none of the things he was looking for, which I told him. He didn't believe me and told me over and over that he would kill me if I didn't tell him where to find what he wanted.
Believe me, there's nothing like the little circle of cold that a gun barrel makes pressed on the back of your neck.
The other thug found a statement that showed that I had $6000 in a bank account, which seemed to infuriate the thug with the gun to my neck. He stomped on my left arm several times, (fracturing my left radius near the elbow, I would learn later.) Asked me again where to find the valuable stuff, and I again told him, the things that they wanted just weren't in the apartment. I told them there was a Fender Strat and a Mesa Boogie amp, take them and go, but they weren't interested, too stupid to know their value or just too hard to trade them for crack, I will never know.
The two of them went back to rummaging in the bedroom, and I could hear one of them say softly to the other, ****, this mother****er got $6000 and aint **** here, we did this for nothing, and I think I'm gonna kill that mother****er!
I believed he just might, and soon, so I started twisting and pulling hard with my legs, and rather quickly managed to tear loose the telephone cord that they were tied with. Nothing like imminent death to put some strength in you.
Moving fast and as quietly as I could I rolled to my stomach, onto my knees (via my forehead) and got up and made for the front door. It was closed, but I turned sideways and reached it with my right hand, and slipped out the door. Ran for the stairs, the door to which opened with a push-bar, ran down the stairs, and out the front of the building.
Ran down the street, hands tied and still gagged, until I came to the Mini Mart four blocks away. The clerk, looking very scared and confused, pulled off the gag, I told him to call the cops.
Cops met me at Mini Mart, went to the apartment, of course the thugs were gone. Cops then finished the job of tearing the apartment apart, detectives told me that these things don't happen by accident, something I did caused this to happen, and that they suspected that I was a drug dealer or some other lawbreaker and I probably deserved it. Actually, the uniformed cops were pretty decent about the whole thing, but the detectives were only slightly less scary than the thugs.
Cops find nothing of interest in the apartment, take some notes, and leave. I stood in the apartment alone, a huge lump on my left temple, my left arm swollen and stiff, and wondered if this could have actually happened, it was just about too crazy to be true. About two seconds later I got in my car, headed North, and stayed with some friends in North County.
I never did see the thugs faces, and the SDPD as far as I ever found out didn't pursue the matter. As far as I know they're still out there. Watch your backs.
Never spent the night in San Diego again.
Except to the detectives, this is the first time I've ever told this whole story.
I was born and raised in Montana, and always had guns, but in that previous life guns were for hunting, skeet, targets, etc. I even owned a SIG P220 that I never even brought to CA (didn't want to the headache of registering it). Home invasions, muggings, senseless killings, these things were for other people, they could never happen to ME, right?
I decided to live in Montana again. Judge me all you want for what I'm about to say, but there are very few black faces in Montana, which makes it easier for me to put this all behind me, especially right after it happened and I was experiencing serious PTSD. Does this make me racist? Maybe, but I've paid my dues and I'm not apologizing.
Also since that day the RKBA is a right that I take very seriously for the purpose of keeping alive, tonight and every night. I feel that anyone who tries to take my guns is putting me at the mercy of those two thugs again, putting that cold little circle on the back of my neck again.
I've had some therapy for the PTSD, but there's nothing that makes me sleep better at night than the double-stack Ruger stashed under the nightstand two feet from my head, shell in the pipe, double-action. I might die in the fight, but I'll never be a victim again, and I'm OK with that.
A few months ago four thugs (players on the U of M Grizzlies football team for Christ's sake) broke into a house in nearby Missoula, tasered and pistol whipped a young couple living there. Eventually they were all caught. Montana is a peaceful place, as much as any place is anyways, but bad can happen anywhere. Keep ready.
, but serves the practical purpose of reminding us that oft-times it is the small things that make a big difference.
