POSTED: 1:59 p.m. EDT, September 9, 2006
NEW YORK (AP) -- Margaret Johnson might have looked like an easy target.
But when a mugger tried to grab a chain off her neck Friday, the 56-year-old Johnson, while riding in her wheelchair, pulled out her licensed .357 pistol and shot him, police said.
Johnson said she was in Manhattan's Harlem neighborhood on her way to a shooting range when the man, identified by police as 45-year-old Deron Johnson, came up from behind and went for the chain.
"There's not much to it," she said in a brief interview. "Somebody tried to mug me, and I shot him."
Deron Johnson was taken to Harlem Hospital with a single bullet wound in the elbow, police said. He faces a robbery charge, said Lt. John Grimpel, a police spokesman.
Margaret Johnson, who lives in Harlem, has a permit for the weapon and does not face charges, Grimpel said. She also was taken to the hospital with minor injuries and later released.
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