On October 23rd of 1974 David Allan Moncrief was born to his over joyed parents, Jack and Pamela. From that moment on he was a happy healthy child. He rarely cried and had a very attractive personality. In restaurants and stores he would initiate conversations with strangers and charm the socks off them. With his blond hair, blue eyes and quick smile he was a beautiful boy and everything his mother and I wanted for him to be.
He loved:
Christmas
birthdays
pizza
the swimming pool
wrestling around on the living room floor
video games
Star Wars and Star Trek
He didn't love:
having to go to bed
having to get up to go to school
Sports (he was the video game type and not the outdoor type
homework
As he grew and matured he had lots of friends and was kind and respectful and well behaved. He had a kind and generous heart and an easy going laid back manner. He was a joy to be around. I'm not sure at what point his life began to get turned around. Did his perceptions change? Was he overly sensitive about some things? Well obviously we missed some signals along the way somewhere.
Let me go ahead and drop the bomb and tell you that at about 6:30 PM on August 6th of 2015 our boy dropped his son off at his job, went home, Locked the front door and went into his bedroom. He locked the bedroom door, laid down on his bed, put the muzzle of my Glock 17 against his heart and pulled the trigger. Now that I have that out of the way I will try to take you through the events that we believe contributed to his decision.
It will forever remain a mystery to me because he was smart, personable and a hard worker. But he had problems holding on to a job all his adult life. When he was employed he always worked all the over time he could get. He had numerous jobs and finally got on with Lyondel and for the first time he was walking in tall cotton. He was assured a bright future and his family were secure. But then they planned a new unit to be build and David was one of the operators chosen to start it up. After weeks of training they decided that it was not a cost effective project after all and dumped it. The entire start up crew was laid off.
Evidently things went down hill rapidly at that point. He just kept sinking lower and lower. After a year and 3 months he took a security job with Top Gun. He had worked security jobs before so he got on easily. I kept telling him that it was too late in his life to go that long with out a job but he was holding on in hopes of getting another plant job. He had many close calls but never got on anywhere.
He decided to go commissioned (armed) to make more money. He was trained up to and including Level 2 and was promoted to corporal in only 6 months. I loaned him my Glock 17 to use until he could either buy that one from me or get another one new or what ever. He was doing fine but TG kept messing up his pay checks and the state had to get involved with getting his ex wife's child support payments out on time. Lots of hassles with his schedule and post assignments as well.
He was not really making enough to support himself but he finally got out and got his own place after living with us for a year. Then his car died and he couldn't afford anything else worth having. I let him use my truck for 4 months so he could save up for a down payment. But eventually he must have felt like there was no hope left. He just barely missed getting a plant job and the vehicle he was about to get got sold out from under him while he was wrestling with TG over his shorted paycheck.
All the circumstances that led to his final act just got to the point where he had nowhere to turn. He wouldn't let anyone in and he wouldn't let any one help. He was tired of having to borrow money and vehicles and a place to live. I don't really understand the concept of suicide but when I try to understand why he did what he did all I can come up with is that he was just too tender a soul to survive this world.
The day of the event, Aug 6th, He never showed up to pick Steven up from work. He called his mom and her and her boyfriend went to get him. Meanwhile I was trying to call him as he was supposed to come by and pick me up and we were going to pick up his new (to him) vehicle. He never picked up or called me back. Steven Called over here and said they were on their way to the apartment and wondered if we'd heard from him as they were still unable to reach him.
I was afraid that some of the drama going on over there might have gotten out of hand so we went over to try and keep the lid on things. When we pulled in to the apartment parking lot there was and ambulance and numerous police cars with their light bars flashing.
Oh my God,no NO. Please....
His ex-wife came running up and hysterically screaming that David was dead. Time got all out of whack at that point. Pam was so torn up I was afraid she would need to be sedated or something. The police were kind and talked to us and tried to help us get a grip on things. They asked the questions they needed to and then left us alone while they investigated the scene etc. The detective asked me if the gun belonged to me and I explained that it was mine and that I was letting him use it on his job. They said that it might be some time before it could be returned to me. I told them that I never wanted to see it or touch it again. In fact I requested that it be destroyed at the conclusion of their investigation.
You all know how passionate I've been for my guns. Well a lot of things in my life can never be the same now. That is one of them. I have always loved going to the range and shooting but now I can't even stand to thing about firing a gun. I will keep a couple for self defense now and I'll continue to carry concealed but I truly believe that my love for shooting is now a thing of the past.
I will keep my .45 1911, The Ruger SP101 .357 mag in case my hands get to where I can no longer operate the controls on a semi auto and the little KelTec .32 auto as a BUG. And I will always keep my grandfathers old .38 top break, My dads 1903, my Ruger Blackhawk and my British Webley .455 that were given to me by dear friends. But all the ones that I just had for variety of guns to shoot at the range will be sold.
For the first couple of day I was afraid that David's suicide was going to ruin Miss Pam and ruin us. But now, despite the awful pain and guilt and confusion I am sure we will make it through this. We have our family. We have our friends. We even have our cats....but mostly we have each other. We will be strong for each-other and we will love and support each other and we'll be alright. We've been doing this for 44 years now and we know we can see each other through this even though this one is the toughest thing we've ever had to face.
I have been asked if I had any anger toward David for doing this. At first I did. But I love him and love forgives. I hate that he did it but I can't judge him and I can't hold on to any anger or resentment. To do what he did, crushing his children (they are both in therapy now) his parents and his friends I know he must have been in a state of mind that I'm just not able to comprehend. I'll focus on the happy times and let go of the bad stuff.
Life is hard. Life isn't fair. The world can be a cold, mean and dangerous place. Still, We will hang on to our faith and to each other and struggle to see the good that is still left out there for what ever time we have left. David was our happy beautiful boy. He had a million dollar smile and an enthusiasm for life. But somewhere this mean old world got on top of him and we didn't see the signs. Y'all please love your children and hold them close to you. If you need to intervene then do it, what ever it takes to get them what ever help they need. It might be unpleasant, It might cause friction. But you don't want what it can cause if you fail to help them.
He loved:
Christmas
birthdays
pizza
the swimming pool
wrestling around on the living room floor
video games
Star Wars and Star Trek
He didn't love:
having to go to bed
having to get up to go to school
Sports (he was the video game type and not the outdoor type
homework
As he grew and matured he had lots of friends and was kind and respectful and well behaved. He had a kind and generous heart and an easy going laid back manner. He was a joy to be around. I'm not sure at what point his life began to get turned around. Did his perceptions change? Was he overly sensitive about some things? Well obviously we missed some signals along the way somewhere.
Let me go ahead and drop the bomb and tell you that at about 6:30 PM on August 6th of 2015 our boy dropped his son off at his job, went home, Locked the front door and went into his bedroom. He locked the bedroom door, laid down on his bed, put the muzzle of my Glock 17 against his heart and pulled the trigger. Now that I have that out of the way I will try to take you through the events that we believe contributed to his decision.
It will forever remain a mystery to me because he was smart, personable and a hard worker. But he had problems holding on to a job all his adult life. When he was employed he always worked all the over time he could get. He had numerous jobs and finally got on with Lyondel and for the first time he was walking in tall cotton. He was assured a bright future and his family were secure. But then they planned a new unit to be build and David was one of the operators chosen to start it up. After weeks of training they decided that it was not a cost effective project after all and dumped it. The entire start up crew was laid off.
Evidently things went down hill rapidly at that point. He just kept sinking lower and lower. After a year and 3 months he took a security job with Top Gun. He had worked security jobs before so he got on easily. I kept telling him that it was too late in his life to go that long with out a job but he was holding on in hopes of getting another plant job. He had many close calls but never got on anywhere.
He decided to go commissioned (armed) to make more money. He was trained up to and including Level 2 and was promoted to corporal in only 6 months. I loaned him my Glock 17 to use until he could either buy that one from me or get another one new or what ever. He was doing fine but TG kept messing up his pay checks and the state had to get involved with getting his ex wife's child support payments out on time. Lots of hassles with his schedule and post assignments as well.
He was not really making enough to support himself but he finally got out and got his own place after living with us for a year. Then his car died and he couldn't afford anything else worth having. I let him use my truck for 4 months so he could save up for a down payment. But eventually he must have felt like there was no hope left. He just barely missed getting a plant job and the vehicle he was about to get got sold out from under him while he was wrestling with TG over his shorted paycheck.
All the circumstances that led to his final act just got to the point where he had nowhere to turn. He wouldn't let anyone in and he wouldn't let any one help. He was tired of having to borrow money and vehicles and a place to live. I don't really understand the concept of suicide but when I try to understand why he did what he did all I can come up with is that he was just too tender a soul to survive this world.
The day of the event, Aug 6th, He never showed up to pick Steven up from work. He called his mom and her and her boyfriend went to get him. Meanwhile I was trying to call him as he was supposed to come by and pick me up and we were going to pick up his new (to him) vehicle. He never picked up or called me back. Steven Called over here and said they were on their way to the apartment and wondered if we'd heard from him as they were still unable to reach him.
I was afraid that some of the drama going on over there might have gotten out of hand so we went over to try and keep the lid on things. When we pulled in to the apartment parking lot there was and ambulance and numerous police cars with their light bars flashing.
Oh my God,no NO. Please....
His ex-wife came running up and hysterically screaming that David was dead. Time got all out of whack at that point. Pam was so torn up I was afraid she would need to be sedated or something. The police were kind and talked to us and tried to help us get a grip on things. They asked the questions they needed to and then left us alone while they investigated the scene etc. The detective asked me if the gun belonged to me and I explained that it was mine and that I was letting him use it on his job. They said that it might be some time before it could be returned to me. I told them that I never wanted to see it or touch it again. In fact I requested that it be destroyed at the conclusion of their investigation.
You all know how passionate I've been for my guns. Well a lot of things in my life can never be the same now. That is one of them. I have always loved going to the range and shooting but now I can't even stand to thing about firing a gun. I will keep a couple for self defense now and I'll continue to carry concealed but I truly believe that my love for shooting is now a thing of the past.
I will keep my .45 1911, The Ruger SP101 .357 mag in case my hands get to where I can no longer operate the controls on a semi auto and the little KelTec .32 auto as a BUG. And I will always keep my grandfathers old .38 top break, My dads 1903, my Ruger Blackhawk and my British Webley .455 that were given to me by dear friends. But all the ones that I just had for variety of guns to shoot at the range will be sold.
For the first couple of day I was afraid that David's suicide was going to ruin Miss Pam and ruin us. But now, despite the awful pain and guilt and confusion I am sure we will make it through this. We have our family. We have our friends. We even have our cats....but mostly we have each other. We will be strong for each-other and we will love and support each other and we'll be alright. We've been doing this for 44 years now and we know we can see each other through this even though this one is the toughest thing we've ever had to face.
I have been asked if I had any anger toward David for doing this. At first I did. But I love him and love forgives. I hate that he did it but I can't judge him and I can't hold on to any anger or resentment. To do what he did, crushing his children (they are both in therapy now) his parents and his friends I know he must have been in a state of mind that I'm just not able to comprehend. I'll focus on the happy times and let go of the bad stuff.
Life is hard. Life isn't fair. The world can be a cold, mean and dangerous place. Still, We will hang on to our faith and to each other and struggle to see the good that is still left out there for what ever time we have left. David was our happy beautiful boy. He had a million dollar smile and an enthusiasm for life. But somewhere this mean old world got on top of him and we didn't see the signs. Y'all please love your children and hold them close to you. If you need to intervene then do it, what ever it takes to get them what ever help they need. It might be unpleasant, It might cause friction. But you don't want what it can cause if you fail to help them.
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