A good Lyft driver with a gun ends a car jacking in west Philadelphia:
Two suspects in an armed carjacking are in the hospital after police say they attempted to take a vehicle from a Lyft who was armed with a gun he was licensed to carry on Monday afternoon in West Philadelphia.
Now, let me be absolutely clear on this; I don’t have any guns, and the thought of shooting someone in self defense is mortifying to me.
But I’m going to bet at least a few carjackers in Philadelphia are mulling changes to career plans.
Lyft drivers are not allowed to carry any kind of weapon, not even pepper spray.
MP.
That may be true, but the driver and his passenger, are both OK. The people responsible for committing the crime, paid the price.
On another note, notice all of the other stories about shootings that are on that link? Oh well, just another normal day in a DemoCommie run city.
Better tried by twelve than carried by six, but MP’s right that this is most likely going to cost the man his Lyft job. Small chance that Lyft might reconsider, though.
One could hope that a few justified self-defense shootings would chill the, er, initiative of car-jackers, but it may just escalate the initial aggression. We’re already seeing thefts where the thug starts with shooting, not with threatening. It’s also hard to shoot at someone already leveling a gun at you.
I’m in favor of enforcing existing laws rather than coming up with new ones, but I wouldn’t mind if society were to say that any youth that uses a gun in a crime automatically “graduates” from juvenile to adult in the system – even if only 14 years old.
Lyft may have a corporate policy against drivers carrying, but that doesn’t make his carrying illegal.
BossHoss, about the shootings in Philly . . .
Minneapolis and Saint Paul are nearly as bad. I think that people who live in those precincts have a kind of “hostage syndrome.”
Where I live, north of the Twin Cities by the Saint Croix, there is virtually no violent crime and very little property crime. You just don’t think about it, you don’t incorporate it into your life style.
From what I can see in the NextDoor app, crime starts to pick up in Forest Lake to the West and Scandia to the SW. But mostly porch pirates and vehicle break ins, not many “hot” robberies.
bet on it – Lyft is about to be sued by some race pimps. They will settle of course, handing the race pimps a fist full of cash AND a change to their company policy that forbids the hiring of anyone with a concealed carry permit.
“Lyft drivers are not allowed to carry any kind of weapon, not even pepper spray.” — MP
So, instead of losing his life, he’ll lose his job. I’m pretty sure the driver will accept that.
Every time an issue does not poll well for the dhimmis they change their tune. Happened with the blm riots/burning/looting, and with defund the police. Some blue mayors and guvs are starting to sound the alarm, mayor of Frisco for one.
Here’s hoping it reduces crime somewhat and ticks off their crime loving base enough to suppress their vote.
Regarding the possibility that the threat posed by carry permit holders to criminals might result in “shoot first and steal later”, per NW’s comment, wouldn’t we see that if it were happening–almost all states have, after all, fairly extensive number of carry permit holders, and it’s not like the people at the Brady Campaign are reluctant to publicize any information that would militate against concealed carry. No?
So while I understand the notion “make your first punch count” in light of the notion that people can fight back, I’m guessing that the reality of life sentences and death sentences for unprovoked first degree murder weigh enough to at least balance that out. There is also the reality that it generally takes some doing to train a person to kill, and that’s not training that we (at least intentionally) give to inner city kids.
And again, hopefully more cab services, not just Lyft or Uber, start to empower their employees to protect themselves.
The technique used in the Philly attempted carjacking wasn’t to summon the Lyft guy and steal his car, it was to cause a minor accident (rear end) and then attempt the car jack when the guy got out of his car to investigate, exchange insurance info, etc.
So the first assault occurs when the jacker hits your car. You gonna drive away and risk getting a hit and run charge? You don’t know if you are getting jacked until you’ve already stopped.
It is a sign of general lawlessness purposefully created in big and medium cities by radical leftist DA’s and prosecutors and their enablers, in city government and of course the voters.
bike – I’d certainly hope that an attacker willing to jack a car or knock down an 80 year old in the parking lot would still have enough decency to not start off with a warning shot to the liver, and would have qualms about killing. Or maybe they’d just not want the hassle of facing a murder or attempted murder charge, though the thought that there are consequences to their actions may come as a surprise to them given their previous experiences.
I’ve been thinking, though, that the reptile brain in all of us is adaptable, if not especially thoughtful. When carjackers see that they’re getting resistance from citizens in parking lots (as in SLP and Edina), they change their strategy to following victims home (Crocus Hill) where there may be less resistance. A rational brain may decide that escalation can lead to serious responses; a reptile brain, not so much. My own reptile brain would say, “fight fire with fire”; my rational brain says, “Hey – let’s just not go where something like this might happen.” (Interestingly enough, I plan to go to a funeral on Friday for a young black man in St. Paul, out of support for his father who is a friend and ministry partner. It’s a balancing act.)
May the odds be ever in you favor, Night Writer.
The joys of the TC. I’m certainly glad that it’s my nearly iron-clad rule to avoid going inside the 494/694 loop at all costs. There may be a cost to avoiding the Cities, but the benefits are immense.
As for that strategy, at my home the yutes would be greeted by either semi-auto shotgun fire, if my wife were at home, or semi-auto rifle fire if I were at home. That is, if we even owned firearms after the tragic canoe incident years back.
Fu**ing canoes suck …….