This is why I carry a firearm, Vol. 2

As I have discussed here previously, one of the main reasons that I carry a firearm on a daily basis is that the police are not required by law to protect you, the individual. Their main duty is to investigate crime and arrest suspects, not act as bodyguards or security for each person in society (Politicians and celebrities excepted, apparently.) YOU are responsible for your personal safety, nobody else.

This incident illustrates this principle to a T. An estranged husband, living apart from his wife, apparently goes ballistic and shows up at his former home, ranting about his soon-to-be ex-wife's new boyfriend. The police are called, but apparently don't do anything to the husband, even though according to his family and friends he had called the house multiple times over the last couple of months, threatening to kill his wife and his family.

Two hours later, it looks like he tracked her down, rammed her car, and chased her into the Fox Lake Police Department, where he beat and strangled her to death. In the lobby. Of the Police Department. She had apparently run into the building in an attempt to get help, only to find that THERE WAS NO ONE ON DUTY. All of the public safety employees were out at the time, which is a common occurrence, according to the news articles. This poor lady tried to save herself, but ended up going into an empty building, where she was a sitting duck for her husband.

Blame? Of course, the husband gets it for committing his crime, but I also blame Governor Jim Doyle of Wisconsin, who has repeatedly vetoed shall-issue concealed carry legislation that this lady might have been able to use to protect herself from her animal husband. The news articles don't say whether a restraining order had been issued, but a piece of paper is not going to stop someone bent on murder. A firearm will. Even if there had been an order issued, no one was around to enforce it, or even to answer the phone at the police station.

The husband has reportedly confessed to the crime, and he will probably be convicted and go to prison for decades. That doesn't help his victim, however, or his family, which will have to deal with this for the rest of their lives.

Sleeping well, Governor Doyle? This one's on your watch.


A personal side note: I have a neighbor that lives a short distance from me. When he first arrived, my other neighbors and I noticed a lot of strange behavior from him, such as telling us that he had just been divorced after having been married for just one month. It wasn't so much the fact of that, it was how he told the story that rang alarm bells for us. We just got a "feeling" that something wasn't right. At a party we had soon after he moved in, he showed up so extremely drunk that he asked me six times which house was mine, even though we were sitting 20 feet away from it, and I pointed it out each time.

Soon after, we found out that he had been arrested for beating his wife badly after arriving home to his previous house in a drunken state. Because of this and the drunken party incident, I decided to go to court for his hearing to see the facts for myself, as we have a large number of small children in our neighborhood, and the parents were concerned about a possibly habitual drunk driver.

At the court hearing, he pleaded guilty to 5th degree domestic assault, and admitted that his blood alcohol level was .27 (!) when he was arrested. Fortunately for him, he wasn't caught actually driving, but he admitted driving before the incident. What really disturbed me was that there were SIX women there to testify that he had beat them severely during his relationships with them as well. This is not innuendo or rumor. I met these women and sat with them during the hearing. This was not a "he said, she said" incident in which the facts are gray about one incident, and one or both parties may be stretching the truth. This man is a drunken serial batterer.

Some of my neighbors, as well as my wife, feel that I am being "too hard" on this man by refusing to talk to him, wave to him, or have anything to do with him. They feel that because we are "neighbors" that I should let bygones be bygones and attempt to be cordial with him.

Not going to happen. Every time I look at that thug I see all of the women he brutalized, as well as imagine how the above story could happen with him, and I will not EVER associate with that kind of scumbag. If that makes me a lousy neighbor, so be it.

Oh, by the way, he is a public safety employee, which I believe got him a lot of leeway with the judge. There's that "fairness" thing again. He hasn't quit drinking, either.