Three separate times all by members of the same police department. I was working a job during odd hours they didn’t expect someone to be there at.
First time I was in my truck the parking lot and a cruiser pulled up. When the officer didn’t get out of her cruiser or offer any instruction from it I got out of my truck and immediately had a gun pulled on me demanding I return to my vehicle. Got to sit hostage in my truck for 20 minutes or so while she played Tetris or something. Eventually she came to me and asked for license and registration, which I provided. I explained I was arriving for work, I had keys to the building and alarm codes, I’m listed as an emergency contact for the company if she wanted to check with the security company listed on the door.
A few weeks later a different office saw me there with the lights on and the door open and came in with his gun drawn demanding I put my hands up. He patted me down pulled my wallet asked questions. Told me have a good night and left.
So after having a gun pulled on me twice for working, I decided to try and be proactive went down to the police station and explained I expected to be at my place of work in the future during off hours and I’d like them to be informed of who I am, what vehicle is mine, and hours I’d expected to be there.
I thought after that I was doing OK because I went a few weeks without having a gun pulled on me. Then the officer from the first incident came in with her gun drawn…(same vehicle outside, no major changes to appearance.) provided ID, explained I was here doing work much the same as previous interaction with the police force including her.
Overtime wasn’t worth having guns pointed at me so I just quit going in at night.
I got off pretty easy though. The same police force was very publicly sued for wrongfully convicting a man of rape and murder.
Pearl Street, Denver, about late '80s, about 2 AM. A drunk guy backing his car down a driveway had to stop for me to pass him on the street; for some reason this enraged him and he chased me down and tried to run me to the curb. When I came to a stop he got out of his car and aimed a .22 automatic across the roof at my head. I accelerated away and he fired off a shot in my general direction. What an asshole.
I was mugged at gunpoint on the subway in New York once in the 1970s. I’m not sure if the guy actually pointed the gun at me, but he certainly threatened me with it.
When I was 17 and worked at a Hallmark store alone in the afternoons/evenings. Two guys came in and waited for the one customer to leave. I’ll skip the rukus I stupidly put up when the one guy opened the register. In the end he was caught and imprisoned for 5 years, where the ADA told me police would be waiting when he got out, to arrest him on a different charge. All for 120 bucks.
From about 1953 to 2015, not counting service related, many many times. Both ends of the weapon.
I can not understand living such a sheltered life as I see recounted here. How boring.
Surveying for aerial mapping = lots. ( never say it is for a railroad spur, people go spaz-nuts-insane )
Hunting
yeah, ranges
Teen friends spring loaded to the dumb ass position.
Motorcycle clubs
Most scary times in civilian colors = mad females with no weapon training, domestic violence situations, ( police are not the only ones who end up dealing with those ) and as above, dumb people who are afraid of weapons, do not know anything but media sound bites and are very stupid.
Never. I’ve lived for half my life in countries where firearms are banned though, I don’t know if that would make a difference. I’m pretty boring, actually.
Twice that I recall. Once it was a cop who thought I had stolen the vehicle he stopped me in. I knew the car wasn’t stolen, and had no intention of moving my hands off the back of it until he told me to, so I wasn’t too worried about that one.
The other time it was a meth head neighbor of my sister’s who had somehow decided everyone in the room was against them, and started waving a shotgun around. That was pretty terrifying. Fortunately, he was talked down, and I never saw that guy again.
I don’t really think about them unless someone asks if I’ve had a gun pointed at me.
I’ve been “muzzle-swept” at the range/gun club a couple of times, had some punk pull and start waving around a 22 when I was working as a bouncer, been shot at once while deer hunting (I guess my orange vest and hat weren’t quite enough for one idiot)
I was in Ocean City and my the bf was wasted. It took him a bit of time to stagger across Coastal Hwy and some yahoos in a pickup got pissed. They could have driven around us but instead they started yelling at us. My bf told them to eat shit and die.
Next thing I know one of the assholes jumps out of the truck, grabs a shotgun out of the rack and points it at us.
I’m so surprised I didn’t get shot because I got pissed and my mouth started running. I called him a big pussy, that he wasn’t man enough to fight without a weapon. Oh, I had lots to say about his lack of manhood because real men don’t hide behind guns, they duke it out and take their lumps. Only a pussy man would pull a gun on an unarmed man.
He lowered the gun, got back in the truck and they sped off.
Now that I think of it, it’s happened a few times, pretty minor events except:
On the way to Fort Lauderdale for Spring Break in '88, it was midnight or so and we were too tired to drive anymore, so we stopped at some cheap motel off the 95 near Jacksonville. We were too cheap to pay for a double so we agreed on a single and we’d all crash on the floor for a few hours.
We sent two guys in and my buddy and I parked the car behind the motel and were having a smoke when I noticed a cruiser speeding by on the next street, followed by another, then another. I remember thinking “Boy, someone must be in real trouble” when all of a sudden they all came around the building and converged on us. They had their spotlights on us and were approaching with revolvers and shotguns out, yelling at us to get on the ground. We complied and they cuffed us and put their guns away. By this time, the other 2 guys had come back out and we explained the situation.
Apparently, we were in a very bad neighbourhood and someone had spotted 2 suspicious guys with long hair and leather jackets scoping out cars in the parking lot of the motel. They gave us a lecture and eventually let us go.
I was in an armed bank robbery, where the guy in line behind me drew a shotgun out of his jacket and cleaned out the teller.
I worked with a guy who grew up in a Central Valley town surrounded by hills. When he was a teen, he was literally shot off of his bicycle - he was on one side of I-80, riding on bike paths, and someone with a substantial rifle was pot-shotting at him from the hills on the other side. One bullet tore through the top tube of the bike, just under his legs, and he spent an hour huddled in a ditch, piddling his pants.
The cops took a lackadaisical report and chalked it up to someone “having fun.”
So… maybe that car backfire you once heard, wasn’t.