Broad daylight, downtown area of central Illinois college town, cool but sunny, pedestrian and vehicular traffic-normal day.
The van in front of me pulled over to the curb abruptly and the driver exited leaving the drivers door open into traffic. As I drove around the open door and entered the next intersection,something hit the drivers side of my van with a very loud thump. It took a while to sink in but I saw 2 B/Ms in my rear view mirror running north on the street I had just crossed. The guy in the car behind me was waving and shouting something. I stopped and looked at the drivers side of my van and found a bullet hole about 3 foot behind my drivers door near the gas cap.
I lost my normally jovial disposition and took the next 2 rights to look for the runners while calling 911. I was a lot calmer when I was shot at in 1977 while in uniform so I don't want to hear the 911 tape of my call today. The troups- all of which I still know and some I trained showed up and I am very certain located the 2 runners I saw but I could not id by face. Neither could another witness who saw them ditch the gun which was recovered. The 2 runners were ided and cut loose for now.
Other witnesses saw a W/M running the opposite direction of the shooting scene so appearently there was a "misunderstanding" between the 3 and my van happened to get in the way.
There was no necessity or opportunity this time to use a firearm but it was reassuring to have one.
Puts you to thinking about a carrying a bigger gun and more bullets.
The van in front of me pulled over to the curb abruptly and the driver exited leaving the drivers door open into traffic. As I drove around the open door and entered the next intersection,something hit the drivers side of my van with a very loud thump. It took a while to sink in but I saw 2 B/Ms in my rear view mirror running north on the street I had just crossed. The guy in the car behind me was waving and shouting something. I stopped and looked at the drivers side of my van and found a bullet hole about 3 foot behind my drivers door near the gas cap.
I lost my normally jovial disposition and took the next 2 rights to look for the runners while calling 911. I was a lot calmer when I was shot at in 1977 while in uniform so I don't want to hear the 911 tape of my call today. The troups- all of which I still know and some I trained showed up and I am very certain located the 2 runners I saw but I could not id by face. Neither could another witness who saw them ditch the gun which was recovered. The 2 runners were ided and cut loose for now.
Other witnesses saw a W/M running the opposite direction of the shooting scene so appearently there was a "misunderstanding" between the 3 and my van happened to get in the way.
There was no necessity or opportunity this time to use a firearm but it was reassuring to have one.
Puts you to thinking about a carrying a bigger gun and more bullets.
