Another happy ending. Woman shoots intruder.

[Peggy Reist]

Another happy ending. Woman shoots knife-wielding intruder (with a .22, no less) 9 times. Bad guy dead. Woman is slightly injured, but will be fine.

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[Austin]

Too bad she had to deal with this. Glad she was able to handle the situation effictively.

 

[MasterGadgets]

One more BG done for!

 

[Rhino]

She needs a bigger gun.

 

[BluesStringer]

She needs a bigger gun.

She hit her target 9 freakin' times. Seems to me she's more than proficient with the gun she has.

 

[Rhino]

She hit her target 9 freakin' times. Seems to me she's more than proficient with the gun she has.

Proficient, yes. But not all altercations will allow the ability to get nine shots in. That suggests the need for a more powerful gun. She still did good though. I'm not faulting her in any way. Just sayin.....

 

[Paladin63]

I guess this answers the question as to whether the .22 is a good defensive round.

It can be argued that the .22 is too small to be called a 'man stopper' but it certainly stopped this guy.

DISCLAIMER: (Which is to say before you write back to slam me) I am not condoning or encouraging the use of .22 as a defensive round. It worked in this instance. Nothing more, nothing less.

 

[BC1]

I wouldn't call this a happy outcome for her. Being forced to shoot a perp is a very unpleasant experience.

 

[cluznar]

People don't realize how much damage a .22 can do. Those bullets can bounce around inside a person and do a lot of damage.
With 9 shots in him I'm surprised he got as far as he did. However, if she had a .32 acp I think 3 or 4 would have been more than enough maybe 2 would have done it. She would be smart to move up to a bigger cal. However if she feels comfortable with a .22 she should practice with it a lot. I carry either a .380 or a .32 with a 3.5 barrel and feel safe.

:dance3:

 

[Rhino]

I wouldn't call this a happy outcome for her. Being forced to shoot a perp is a very unpleasant experience.

I think the point was more along the lines of the outcome of being attacked and and forced to shoot a perp had a happy ending. The circumstances were of course tragic, and she'll of course have significant issues to deal with as a result. But those will be much happier than they would have been had she not have been able to defend herself successfully. "Happy ending" was therefore used in more of a relative sense. You bring up a good point though that doesn't get mentioned much here. Even a successful self defense event has negative repercussions on a victim, particularly if they have to kill the perpetrator. The effects are both physical and psychological, and the physical effects are not at all limited to your body. They can include significant legal or socioeconomic issues. There are a number of good references out there on these topics that are well worth the time spent reading them.

 

[jimster]

Any gun will do. It's all about shot placement.

 

[JSDinTexas]

Nine shots of .22, wherever they hit, still allowed the perp to exit the house, collapse in the yard, then die at the hospital.
So irrespective of what is said about the .22 as a defense weapon, I will concede that nine .22 rounds may be a deterrent.

Nine shots is a long time - I think I'll stick with my G30. One thing I may change though, is to start taking it in the shower with me - it won't hurt it.

 

[Rhino]

Any gun will do. It's all about shot placement.

That's not true. Shot placement is indeed the most critical factor, but is by no means the only one. Certainly any gun is better than no gun, and it usually doesn't make sense to have more gun than you can handle, but the effectiveness of more powerful calibers is not irrelevant by any stretch of the imagination. People who have never fired a gun have picked up one far more powerful than they'd probably ever choose for themselves and successfully defended their lives with it. People with many years of firearms experience have emptied magazines of small caliber guns into the center mass of assailants and still lost their lives. The converse of those stories is also true. Any gun will not do, and conversely there is no perfect gun either. You never, ever rely on one simple axiom or one simple trait like "any gun" or "big bore" to get you by. Chances are it may not get you by at all. You realize that any self defense scenario has many facets and many variables to it, and that many factors will play into your survivability in that scenario. Some you can control and some you can't. One thing you can control is the use of the gun. And I say use of the gun because the gun itself does nothing for you. You do something for yourself by using it. You start doing it the day you choose and buy the gun, but it only starts there. There's still plenty to do after you buy it. Whether the gun is a 25 or a 45, its' effectiveness will be determined more by you than by it. The caliber of the gun only gives it the potential to inflict damage. It's up to you to use it properly to make that actually happen when you need it most. In fact, your success will almost certainly depend more on how you prepare yourself than it will on the type or caliber of your gun. But if all else remains equal, the same scenario, the same tactics, the same physical environment and the same players, then what gun you're holding will most definitely make a difference, possibly the difference between life or death. Yours. Because although any gun is good for self defense, and any gun is way better than no gun at all, not all guns are equal. Not even close.

 

[wolf_fire]

I echo what BC1 says... there was no happy ending here. A woman was attacked in her own home and she had to use lethal force. She will never be able to forget this day for the rest of her life. A just ending?...yes; an ending where the victim is relieved to be alive?... yes;... a happy ending? definitely no.

As far as the caliber debate goes... I have to assume if she put 9 shots in him with a .22, it was a revolver and she emptied it. If she had a larger caliber, chances are she would have emptied that too and not stopped at 3 or 4 as some have mentioned. What she had did the job. Or did it? The man was still able to run from her in the bedroom and then run through the house and out of the back door before he collapsed in the yard... he still was not dead at this point; he didn't die until he got to the hospital. Imagine what more he could have done if he hadn't ran. If this is all the caliber that the victim can handle, then it is the right weapon for her. If she can handle something more substantial, I agree with those that say a bigger caliber is in order. Fortunately, this dirt bag only had a knife.

 

[cometface]

It is good that this women was able to defend herself.

 

[mappow]

Sirhan Sirhan used a 22 against Robert F. Kennedy and was proficient with it. Don't discount it's possibilities. Any lead is better then no lead. Especially with a smaller framed woman.

 

[Greggatshack]

I think that if you put yourself in the target's shoes (and by target I mean the person at the pointy end of the gun), you will be pretty upset with a .22 round entering ANY part of your body. By the time you have nine of them you will be screaming for mercy.

While the .22 is certainly enough to despatch a lone intruder, one would also need to think about the scenario of multiple intruders. If I lived in the USA and required a gun for self-defence I wouldn't want anything less than my wife's Glock 22 (misleading model number there) which is a .40 S&W calibre and comes with no less than 15 round magazines.
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[BluesStringer]

As far as the caliber debate goes... I have to assume if she put 9 shots in him with a .22, it was a revolver and she emptied it. If she had a larger caliber, chances are she would have emptied that too and not stopped at 3 or 4 as some have mentioned. What she had did the job. Or did it? The man was still able to run from her in the bedroom and then run through the house and out of the back door before he collapsed in the yard... he still was not dead at this point; he didn't die until he got to the hospital. Imagine what more he could have done if he hadn't ran. If this is all the caliber that the victim can handle, then it is the right weapon for her. If she can handle something more substantial, I agree with those that say a bigger caliber is in order. Fortunately, this dirt bag only had a knife.

Maybe her goal was simply to stop the threat, not be the cause of his death. I was always taught that stop the threat is both the legal and the ethical/moral rationale for opening fire on someone. I have tried to eliminate the thought of *wanting* someone to die for failing at an attempt to victimize me or mine. I've never been victimized physically, so it remains to be seen how well I have programmed myself. In fact, I hope it remains unseen until the day I die. But I know for sure that if I shoot and only wound someone, I will not consider myself a lesser marksman or that I didn't accomplish what I intended to accomplish by being armed in the first place. I sincerely hope that, even if I do have to shoot someone, they live to regret it and repent for their crimes.

Blues

 

[Peggy Reist]

OK, I will concede that if the intruder had been armed with a gun instead of a knife, it probably would have had a much different ending. Sometime during being shot 9 times, he probably would have gotten off a couple himself. And they wouldn't have been .22s. This was just an example of the 'perfect storm'.
However I still maintain that it was a happy ending. If I was that woman, I might not have been happy about being the one to take his life, but make no mistake, I would have still been happy that it was him and not me. Therefore I wouldn't have a problem living with the results.

 

[Rhino]

Maybe her goal was simply to stop the threat, not be the cause of his death. I was always taught that stop the threat is both the legal and the ethical/moral rationale for opening fire on someone. I have tried to eliminate the thought of *wanting* someone to die for failing at an attempt to victimize me or mine. I've never been victimized physically, so it remains to be seen how well I have programmed myself. In fact, I hope it remains unseen until the day I die. But I know for sure that if I shoot and only wound someone, I will not consider myself a lesser marksman or that I didn't accomplish what I intended to accomplish by being armed in the first place. I sincerely hope that, even if I do have to shoot someone, they live to regret it and repent for their crimes.

That's an excellent point.