DGC plus three

Web wanderings today bring us another three DGC stories.

Yesterday via Fox59  via Bearing Arms: a bad guy tries the old ATM double withdrawl  (good guy withdraws cash from ATM, bad guy attempts to withdraw cash from good guy).   But talk about a poor choice of location, the ATM is across the street from IMPD West End Police HQ where officers are having roll call and hear the shots.  they came running and found one dead, one wounded.

Note the ATM is in front of a Kroger grocery store.  As BA notes, hopefully this will wake up shoppers to the need to carry a gun and why Kroger should not make itself a gun free zone.

DGC:496


Next from Omaha we have the story of a father at home with his 4 YO daughter.  The doorbell rang twice and before dad could get to the door, the BadGuy has kicked it in.  Fortunately Dad has his gun and shoots the intruder.

Today we learn the shooting has been ruled justified.

Good shooting Dad!

DGC: 497

And finally from WRAL in South Carolina  again via Bearing Arms:

A homeowner shot and killed a masked man early Sunday who had broken into the Timberlake home, aimed a shotgun and demanded money, authorities said.

Fortunately the good guy shot first.  It must have been a good shot as he didn't survive the helicopter trip to the trauma center and into surgery.

The remaining question is will the now dead bad guy's girlfriend be charged under the felony-murder rule.  She was found driving in the area at the time, but can they tie her to the crime?

DGC: 498

It was a dark and stormy night...

No really it was.

Doppler RADAR was clear about 0030 but the noise of the rain on the roof woke me from a dead sleep around 0220.  To say it rained cats and dogs would be an understatement. Let's go with tigers and wolves for now.  The first band moved off by 0300 followed by another around 0630 and a third around 0830 as I headed to work.  Local news reports Phoenix Sky Harbor logged 3.69" rain and surrounding communities reported 5" give or take.

Streets were flooded.  Case in point, SandCastle Street:

Photo credit SandCastle Queen c2014

The SCQueen waded in about a foot of water to take this picture.

It helps to understand Arizona laws regarding water retention.  I've been told* Arizona state law requires a land owner to retain any and all water that falls on his property, on his property.  This helps recharge the ground water and simplifies city provided storm run-off management.  While communities that regularly receive a surplus of water they can easily divert storm surplus out to sea,  We live in  desert and every bit of water that falls upon us is precious should be saved for the future.

Now it's not terribly practical for each home owner residing on a sub-acre lot of suburbia to comply. Instead each section of suburbia has a low spot that the storm run-off drains to, also called retention basin.

Our community retention basin is 90 degrees to the right of the above picture and  750 ft down the street seen here:

Photo Credit SandCastle Queen c2014

The retention basin is about the furthest you can see in the shot above.  The four tall palm trees just right of the close in palm at the left edge is in the retention basin.

360 days a year the retention basin is conveniently disguised as an inviting grassy park.  Ours even has a sand covered tot play area and a sports court with basketball rims.  5 days a year it's a small pond after typical summer thunder-boomer.  Once or twice a century that "pond" overflows and the local drains backup into the street.

Like this:

Photo Credit SandCastle Queen c2014

The water retention basin is to the left, sports court close edge marked by the basketball hoop.  The rest of the retention basin heads off about 500' to the left.

The main street bends off to the right of the fire hydrant towards the previous pic.

Judging by the fire hydrant, the sidewalk is about a foot underwater.  The street another half foot below that.  The basket ball rim suggests the sports court is about 4 feet deep and there are deeper parts of the park than that.  Some residents near the park reported 4" water in their homes.

Compared to many other parts of the country, 4-6 inches of rain over a couple hours is a normal summer rain shower, or just the opening bids of a hurricane.  But places like that have storm run off systems to deal with that kind of run-off on a regular basis.

This was one for the record books in these parts!

* IANAL and I haven't bothered to research the relevant ARS.  But it makes sense to me.

DGC + 1 2

This is the kind of headline I like to read:

"...Homeowner shoots, kills burglary suspect"

 Two guys break in and hold two women and an 11 YO at gunpoint.  Guy sleeping in the back of the house wakes up and comes out shooting.

The comments are refreshing in that there wasn't much attempt to paint the intruders as choirboys.  

DGC: 494

And I just spotted another one At Albuquerque Journal via Breitbart:  Badguy robs a DQ, but isn't satisfied with the take and keeps pointing the gun demanding more.  GoodGuy comes around the corner and shoots the bad guy.

Fortunately the right people are alive and the aggressor is not.  Obvious question is whether corporate will have anything to say about it.  I hope the word is "Thank you" or "good shot", but all too often the word is "You're fired".  We'll keep an eye on this one.

DGC:495

Update:  The bad guy's name has been released.  The story includes this gem:

Sergeant Aaron Williamson said he has an extensive criminal history.