Heidi’s Story 2
Sep11
Anyone who’s suffered a home invasion by force knows just how quickly it can go rotten.
People place way too much faith in deadbolts and doors. They are easily compromised, especially by a prybar or crowbar. I have both suffered a home invasion of this kind (no crowbar, but a hard kicking foot was more than enough to shatter the doorframe), and I allegedly may have also broken into a house (with a crowbar). They are flimsy constructs, most of the time. You lean a bar into the doorframe, shit shatters, and all that’s left is one good kick. This applies to any door not made of steel, and any doorframe not also made of steel.
Don’t believe me? Ask a cop.
Something happened 12 years ago… what was it? I can never remember…
My wife asked me to put a deadbolt on our exterior pedestrian Garage door. I told her if someone really wanted to break in a deadbolt on that door was not going to stop them. in fact, a brick or large rock would be much easier since we have a nice 4 seasons room, with an interior french door to the house.
I also am of the mind that if i need have a gun at my house to feel safe, I would move.
To be honest, I don’t think that having a home defense firearm is about safety. Safety is keeping people out of the house; strong doors, good windows, good neighborhood, etc. The firearm is for defending yourself and your loved ones until the Police can arrive. I mean, the entire situation when someone is forced to defend their life and property is inherently unsafe.
I also believe that most people who feel safe because they are armed, are being rather overconfident of their ability to utilize the firearm, while in a stressful situation. Too many times on the internet, I see people posturing and proclaiming ridiculous ideals in the name of self defense; saying how anyone who breaks into their property is going to get the shit kicked out of them, and then shot, how they only need one shot per assailant (and anyone who needs more should spend more time on the range), et cetera. Except that the vast majority of people claiming this shit, have never taken a defensive firearms use course, nor train in any scenario other than pristine conditions at a range against static targets (or perhaps predictable moving targets).
I’ve always felt that it is pretty ignorant to think that it will not or can not happen to you, wise to know that it can happen to you, and paranoid to think that it will happen to you.
Remember, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away.
I was acquainted with a guy in my town and we were facebook friends, til one day he posted GLOBAL pictures of his new house complete with a giant flat screen TV. By Global I mean the entire internet could see. I sent him a message to warn him about it, and he got mad at me and said ‘I have a gun, I’m not scared’. Yup, that’ll help when you’re at work and your wife and daughter are home alone, asshole. I tried to tell him I was just trying to help, but he stayed pissy and then defriended me. Suddenly I knew why he had so many issues with the rest of his family (he was always complaining about them).
Minor point on the video – he’s on the inside of the door already, levering it in the direction it’s made to go. In fact, he’s taking the slow way, because he’s on the side of the door with the hinges. All he has to do is remove the hinge pins w/that crowbar, and the door comes right off.
That’s not to say prying open the frame is all that much harder from the outside, but it does take a little more force and effort to get the door to go in the other direction – it’s got those hinge pins keeping it from moving easily.
So it still wouldn’t take long, and the overall point is a good one, but a demonstration video for prying open a security door shouldn’t start with the premise that the bad guy is already inside.
I’m confused. I thought Heidi just moved? How did A-hole ex-roomate’s ex-boyfriend find her? Well, I will trust our dedicated team of professional storytellers to reveal all, I suppose. *goes back to following fanatically*
IIRC, it was Heidi’s roommate who moved out.
Said roommate may not have told the abusive dick she was moving (would you?), and so he went there looking for her, and determined to see her.
I know of one case like that from back when I lived in South Carolina. It ended similarly to how I expect this arc will, but instead of the girl shooting the abusive dick, a stout fellow known as “Daddy” happened to be driving up, and he had a double-barreled shotgun in his truck.
He said, “Hey stop doing that!”, the guy turned, crowbar raised, and BOOM! BOOM! All over, except for calling the police and repainting.
Ah well in England we’re not allowed guns… no rules on swords and axes though….
Although my friend had the best deterrent, overweight ginger guy living on his own. His anti-buglary device was a gimp mask and sleeping in the nude. Slip on the mask and walk out rubbing your nipples… hillarious but I hope he never has to resort to it!
…false.
http://www.blades-uk.com/1988ACT.php
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7331099.stm
I’ll point out that the ban on swordsticks came after 56-year-old Eric Butler used one in 1987 to defend himself against two men who attacked him on the London Underground. That was the only time a swordstick had been involved in a crime prior to the 1988 Criminal Justice Act, and despite swordsticks not being banned under British law at the time he used one, Butler was tried and convicted of carrying an offensive weapon.
It would be unwise to consider yourself to be acting legally in England if using anything for self-defense other than bare hands and feet. (…or perhaps gimp masks.)
What about a cricket bat?
Oh no, I just thought of something. J. has said several times in the comments here that every single comic he’s put up has some sort of significance. Remember Heidi’s legally blind I-can-see-you-fucking-in-the-hallway neighbor? I REALLY hope he didn’t come over to investigate the noise and got caught in the cross-fire…..
I assumed the significance there would be related to her exhibitionism.
Steel doors and stone walls, folks. Make sure that a pro sets your exterior door frame. Every man’s home is his castle ain’t just a cute turn a phrase.
As the survivor of a home invasion (3 guys had been hitting my area, first time was just simple tie up, 2nd time they beat the crap out of the homeowners, 3rd time husband was killed, 4th time husband/wife/pet was killed, 5th time was supposed to be me but I didn’t give them that chance) I can say that the only things you should rely on, with regards to any home security devices is time. A determined individual is going to get in, no matter what everyone says. You just want it to take them as long as possible to get in so you have time to react.
One swift boot and your door is open? No good. 4 or 5 good kicks is better. Pretend you’re a burglar sometimes and case your own house. Where would be the easiest access points, how sturdy is your front door? Solid metal construction into solid door joints and frame? Or is it a solid door with a gigantic window that would be easy to break and reach in to unlock?
Major thing that turned out in my favor was the fact that they tried to come in through my back porch. 1 sturdy metal door into the back room of my house, then another solid wooden door. By the time they kicked that one open they had completely lost the element of surprise.
Thankfully the only home invasion that’s ever affected me was done without harm to family or property (beyond the theft of course). The sad part is while we know exactly who was responsible – a friend of the family’s son with little to no ethics and a history of petty theft – without much proof other than that the perpetrator entered with a hidden spare key and only took a couple hundred bucks worth of stuff there wasn’t anything we could do.
Had to kick my own door down, once (I had to get to work and all the locksmiths were closed). Took just two hard wacks to break it open. No matter how strong the lock itself is, if it’s only set in wood it might as well be made of it.
When I was a teenager, my brother and I got in a fight – He jumped into the garage and locked the door, then mocked me from the ‘safe’ side. My kick didn’t beak the lock or frame – It knocked the entire frame right out of the wall, door and all.
I was so shocked, I forgot to beat my brother’s ass.
Then I got to learn some basic carpentry in putting the door back in place… :-p
“I don’t blame you for hating me” is something manipulative people say specifically to get you to say that you don’t hate them. It’s a pretty sure sign that you should.
Even metal door frames won’t stop a determined thief.
A family member living in DC told me about an apartment building with steel doors/door frames that had a rash of burglaries. Since most people were at work during the day, the thief simply took an extra-long pry bar and wrenched the door frame away from the lock. Last I heard, there were no leads or witnesses, just frustration.
When my apartment was robbed, we’re pretty sure they just took a sledgehammer to the doorknob. You’d have to reinforce a door pretty heavy to stand up to that.
Yup. Door knockers are pretty much unbeatable without you have heavy hardware and really robust construction.
I used to do some locksmithing and security hardware installation for rental properties.
Locks only stop honest people.
Security hardware’s only real function against thieves is to divert them to other, easier targets.
Or slow them down enough that other, more effective security techniques can be brought into play.
Same story with safes – Any safe can be broken. But the tougher ones take long enough that either most thieves go elsewhere, or get caught in the process of cracking them.
@ Braegan
Shotguns, Rifles and Crossbows are not mentioned in the Criminal Justice Act 1988. And I would point out that the Criminal Justice Act of 1988 only restricts Honest Citizens…not Criminals that are going to do whatever they can to get illegal weapons.
There are shooting clubs for Rifles and Shotguns And Pistols in the UK…it is in fact not Illegal to own firearms in Great Britain. Th.ere are permits you can get. Same for Canada and Australia.
It’s also not difficult to Make a 2 shot .38 cal handgun with plastic and resin if you are adept and model making.
For that matter check out this linkedin profile : http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidbyron
Bryon has been working on developing a reliable and reusable ceramic barrelled all-plastic pistol since around 2001 with actual DoD funding..
There are shooting clubs for Rifles and Shotguns And Pistols in the UK…it is in fact not Illegal to own firearms in Great Britain. Th.ere are permits you can get.
My bold. (I am not a lawyer.) (But I am English)
Yes, you can get a rifle or shotgun in the UK. Shotguns are a bit easier to be granted a license for, as you don’t need to prove a “need” to own one.
The UK is made up of “Home Nations”, which have slightly differing legal systems for historic reasons; Scotland, Northern Ireland, England and Wales.
In Scotland, England or Wales (AKA “Mainland Britain”, as it excludes Northern Ireland) you cannot get a license for a pistol (that shoots metallic cartridges) for target shooting purposes.
-You can own a pistol if you have a paying job putting animals down (Crippled Race-horses, deer that have been hit by cars etc.). Usually the police insist that the weapon be a revolver, and that all but two of the chambers be plugged with epoxy-resin. (There is a growing backlash that this as it’s not described in primary legislation, and amounts to an unsafe modification that the gun-maker has not approved of. In the UK health-and-safety law takes precedence and some of us are waiting for a binding ruling on this subject.)
-Muzzle-loading pistols (including cap-powder-and-ball revolvers) were exempted from this ban. About a quarter of pistol shooters in mainland Britain joined the Western Action Shooting Society and went down this route in 1998, but I understand that taking 5 mins to reload and spending hours clearing corrosive gunk out of the chambers has proven less exciting for many of them since.
-You can own a particularly unique pistol un-deactivated if it’s rare or unique to keep in a museum, if the authorities are convinced you don’t plan on acquiring ammo for it – e.g. Winston Churchill’s pistol from the Boer-war can stay in a museum.
-If you managed to convince a senior policeman, before the 1998 ban came in, that your particularly old and unique pistol (e.g. a Colt M1911 cambered in the breathtakingly rare 0.455″ Royal Navy Auto cartridge) was so old & unique that there was historic/scientific merit in occasionally fabricating and testing a new handloading of the ammo, you could own it and occasionally test it’s accuracy with the new loading. You might even meet a fellow shooter with similar vintage weapon and compare accuracy. But, you mustn’t call it a target shooting match!!!
The Dunblane-Incident destroyed target pistol shooting on mainland Britain (England, Wales & Scotland).
Northern Ireland is different. Sadly this is due to decades of sectarian terrorism.
In N.I. it is very hard to get a license granted.
In N.I. a license is needed for several things that aren’t restricted on the British mainland: Airguns, Blank-firing “Starting Pistols”, individual Magazines.
However, for some reason, Northern Ireland was overlooked in the 1998 pistol ban.
My understanding is that the last 1000-or-so UK pistol shooters live in N.I.
But what does this have to do with Home Defense? — Nothing at all!
In much of Europe, the legal theory is that the nation-state has the monopoly on the right to use lethal force.
In the UKOn mainland Britain (I am less certain of the facts in N.I) each and every gun is licensed to be used for a specific purpose:“To shoot ducks with” , “To do target shooting with” et.c
Guns must be kept locked (separate from their ammo) when not being legitimately used. The gun-safe must be out of plain sight in your home.
If you have a gang of thugs breaking down your door, in Britain the advice is to phone the Police and hope for the best. We do not have much in the way of castle doctrine any more. Force used against the intruder must be “proportional” to the threat. Effectively, this means that you must risk being mortally wounded before you can use lethal force (ironically both Tasers & incapacitant sprays are so illegal they don;’t even have license category). In theory a gun owner should swallow the key to his gun-safe on being burgled – to avoid the weapon falling into criminal hands, rather than pull it out and attempt to defend his kin with it!
Nearly every “home-defence” shooting that I’ve ever heard of in the UK has lead to the resident being arrested and charged with a variety of offences, with the police jumping to the worst conclusion – until a clear case of the resident preserving their own life was shown. Often the charge of using the gun for a purpose outside of its licence condition is tacked on as a burglar is not a Duck, nor a target on the rifle range!.
I can only think of three cases of lawful home-defence that ended well for the resident in about 25-years.
One home-defender was brought to trial for murdering the intruder, and was only exonerated because witnesses on the street heard the intruder shout that he was going to kill the defender.
Another pair- a married-couple, who were both keen clay-pigeon shooters – were kept in Police custody for 72hrs – having not even been allowed to talk to each other – after shooting a burglar. They left their gun in the Police evidence locker and got on a plane out of the country within 24 hours of the Coroner ruling the Burglar had died through his own misadventure and their subsequent release.
Only the last guy escaped actually being arrested. He was into his 70s and lived in the countryside. He had been hoping to shoot some crows that were picking at his vegetable garden with a single-barrelled 0.410″ s/g, when a dude walked into his garde with a large knife. The intruder was wounded in the foot when the old boy was so startled, he dropped the shotgun and it went off on hitting the ground!.
Love the comic. Been following it since the first week. Keep it up!
Real Estate Contractor here – I can confirm that locks – even deadbolts – are only good for keeping lazy criminals out of your house. Most knobsets can be opened by simply twisting the locked knob with channel locks or a pipe wrench. Most deadbolts are made of relatively soft brass, and can be defeated by drilling two small holes.
But that’s only if you don’t want to cause any significant damage to the door or frame. If you don’t care about this, the majority of doors can be opened with a couple hip checks. Bashing the knob or deadbolt with a 3-lb hand-sledge will usually bust either the door or the frame better than a kick – you’re able to dump all the energy straight into the weak point. Crowbars are more stereotypical burglars tools, but inferior, IMO, to hammer or pliers. (They are quite useful for other purposes, though)
Basically, static defenses are just a couple levels above worthless. You’re not talking about serious security until something is actively responding to the intruder’s presence, whether that’s you, your three 150lb Mastiff/Rottweiler mutts, or your alarm system with 250-decibel klaxon (designed not just to scare intruders, but to make them bleed from the ears), you need some sort of active defense actually engaging the attackers.
My father did some security consulting for the Army at one point, checking how best to secure armories against break-in. He scared them badly – At one point he broke into a guarded, live armory using a heavy sledge wrapped thoroughly in burlap. Guards out front didn’t recognize the dull thumping as a threat, and he made it though the outer rear concrete wall in less than ten minutes.
Needless to say, things changed afterwards. Not gunna say *how* they changed; I hope you understand why.
I suspect they just wired the door with an alarm.
Not really deep thinkers, that lot (I refer you to the guards at night who IGNORED A LOUD THUMPING NOISE).
Still nothing a overly intelligent criminal couldn’t get past – because really, consider exactly the sorts of people to go after a US Army Armory – the bug-fuckingly insane, and the disgustingly smart)
Well, that was the point of the burlap. Well-wrapped, a sledge isn’t all that loud. And coming from the backside of the building, well, it doesn’t sound like it’s in the vicinity at all. Might be someone on the arty range doing night fire, might be construction somehwhere…
They did more than alarm the doors – Those were already alarmed. 😉 Again,a s noted elsewhere, the steps were made to make it take time, and be noticable when someone tried to break the building… But given enough time and the right circumstances, anything can be broken open.
Agreed it was mostly PR, but useful PR. The real threats to armories are always the people who man them.