Just so I'm clear, your plan is to flee a business being robbed, retrieve a long gun from your car, and return to the business to save the day?

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Wisdom comes thru fear . . .

I like the "flee the business being robbed" part!

A lot of "what-if" in this thread. I was in a gun fight as a young cop, armed with my issued Colt Detective Special (I was a robbery detective), and nothing goes the way you think it will. I fired all twelve rounds on my person, hit the bad guy (BG) four times but didn't know it, and had to end the fight with a blackjack. I'm not a cop anymore, am much older now, and would do everything I could to avoid engaging the BG regardless of what I was carrying.

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Old Cop
LEO (Ret.)

We can't plan for every possible event. Three or four armed bad guys in a crowded business is possible. Unless this is a planned mass murder (terrorist style), I would expect robbery is the motive. A gunfight would be the absolute last option for me. The chaos of multiple, civilian dressed shooters would be incredible. Unless I felt that I was about to be killed, or others were about to be systematically murdered, being a "good witness" or better yet, out a side door would be my priority.

I do tend to carry a 9/40 caliber, higher capacity auto with a spare magazine if I plan on going to places that seem higher risk. If I need more than 25-30 rounds, I didn't think far enough ahead.....or just incredibly unlucky.

As a side note..... My son used to work nights at a fast food place while he was going to college to help pay bills. I saw him putting a second wallet in his pants one day. He said that he kept 3-4 dollar bills and some of the generic "sample" credit cards that you get in the mail in the extra wallet. Hand the fake one to the bad guys if they robbed the store. He wasn't quite 21 yet and had no WCL. An interesting idea about the wallet.

In Columbia SC a couple weeks ago a couple thugs decided to rob a barber shop and everybody in it. One thug had a handgun. The other thug had a shotgun. The barbershop had two CWP holders in it. They kept their cool until the one with the shotgun got distracted for a second, then immediately killed the thug with the handgun. When the badass with the shotgun realized shots were flying and he wasn't sure from where, he turned tail and ran like a rabbit. Most thugs, and terrorists, I think don't do so well when they find a crowd that shoots back. In my opinion, rather than gun control, we need to extend the stand your ground law to allow lawfully armed CWP holders to chase down and kill thugs while they are in flight. Would save taxpayers a lot of money, reduce crime, and make the world a safer place for honest people. As it is now, when they start running, you cannot chase them down. Rather, you have to let them go and wait to see if they show up somewhere else later.

Yippee-ki-yay, mother#*$&@*

i carry a VP9 and 2 spares. am i going to get in a gunfight with 3-4 baddies? not if i can avoid it. they can have my cash and cards. any threat of grave bodily harm to my wife and kiddies? the fight is on. i may be out shot, but i'm not going to be out-gunned...

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why? why not?

For those who advocate handing over the wallet, allow me to give you food for thought. Take a look at what most men carry in their wallet. Driver's license, now Mr. Robber has your home address. And birthdate, for those handy credit applications. CHL? Now he knows you keep weapons at home, at least one. Pictures of your family? Good, so he can identify your wife/daughter/son, etc. Vehicle insurance card? Yep, and he knows who every licensed driver in your family is and what they drive. Health insurance card? Oh, good, now he knows, or can easily find out, where you work. And when. Give me a man's wallet, access to a cell phone, and an hour, and I can most likely tell you all of the above information and more. Give me a day, and I can get his garage door code, probably his ATM PIN, and other choice tidbits of info. Buy a cheap nylon wallet, throw a couple of dollar bills in it, one of those generic ID fill-in-the-blank cards with fake info on it, and give them that. Give the fake ID name to the cops when you're filing the report so they can ID the wallet as evidence if found. I'll give a robber a few bucks. I'm not giving him the means to invade my life and harm my family.

"Now. I want you to go in that bag and find my wallet."

"Which one is it?"

"It's the one that says bad m...........!"

Like many said stay low, but be ready to empty a mag or wheel or two.

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Spin The Wheel

In a scenario like that, 3 maybe 4 bad guys, no matter where you are, the best thing to do, is do nothing, unless the SHTF! Then you have to fight!!!

Of all the scenarios that might take place, the most dangerous is the terrorist attack on a public place. You are going to have zero time to figure out what his intentions are. You have to size up the situation and take immediate action to save any lives, including your own. You may have to make a head shot because of body armor. If it's an old fashioned robbery and the bad guys are hiding their identity, youre probably ok because they want to get out and remain unknown. Don't act unless necessary. If it's a robbery and they don't appear to care about hiding their faces, you better have your hand on your gun and be ready. If you're going to carry, please, please everybody, practice as often as you can. Practice so much that your pistol use is total muscle memory and it comes as easy as zipping up your pants.

Most of your garden variety thugs won't hang around to measure what size hole you put in them or their pals. That's what their lair is for. A number of other thug-types probably won't want witnesses left around to tell on them. Your job to figure what's in front of you. Some of you guys wouldn't go back from your car to help your mom still in the place? A shotgun or whatever in the trunk is never a bad idea. Worst case you never use it. Decent case: you put a just-hit-by-a-car deer out of it's misery. Two hundred and fifty deer whacked by cars in my home-town here last year. (look up the numbers for your state). Your other choice to not shooting cause you'll hit every other person in the store except the bad guys would be to not shoot when a "good guy" is in the line of fire. Also, I think they say in most "Carry" classes to not keep shooting when the Law shows up. You could have a negative circumstance. Don't they cover that in every state?

If you're still shooting when the law shows up, that's gonna be a 5 or 10 minute gun battle. That's a lot of ammo! At any rate, when the cops run up to the scene, you best not be holding a gun.

Regardless of where one comes down on this scenario, there is a lot of GOOD food for thought from most of the posters. Thanks, fellas, keep it up.

S/F,

RAS (aka Walter)

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A man's got to know his limita

Rock and roll kid has introduced what I will call an interesting field training exercise. I have read through the entire thread, and noticed that virtually everyone has taken liberties in filling in the details. The OP identified the setting as "an eatery", but this has evolved from a fast food restaurant to a diner, to a sit down restaurant!

This is evolving like a nice card game ... you never really know how the game will go until you have been dealt your final card! The various types of eating establishments create different variables and different twists to the situation at hand.

I am certain that no one here wishes to be the reason lead starts flying in a restaurant, and turning it into a free fire zone. I think that a situation like this becomes more probable as the economy gets worse; hence, we must give it a higher degree of consideration.

I think that the wisest move is to wait and observe how the situation evolves, and act/react accordingly.

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Judge control not gun control!