My husband and I own a paintball field in a pretty rural area. Either Monday or Tuesday night someone hooked a pick-up truck to the front gates and pulled them off.
Once they drove onto the property, they used the truck to destroy our covered staging area, our target range, every picnic table, bench, and sign on the field. They also drove onto the playing fields and attempted to trash those, with some success.
After that fun they got out of the truck and took a sledgehammer to our building. What could possibly be next? They tried (thank God it had rained) to set the staging area on fire.
WHY???
We’ve spent 3 years building everything out there with our bare hands. We’ve poured every penny into our field- it’s our future and we’ve worked SO HARD to make it great. Only the fields are salvageable- all the public areas look like a tornado hit.
The best part?? On Sunday (that’s about 48 hours from now) morning we’re hosting a tournament. Fifteen teams are coming in from all over Texas to play at my field. As far as we know, no one is angry with us- we have a good reputation and have helped out lots of players. I almost think it’s scarier that total strangers could do something so violent for no reason.
To see something you love destroyed for no reason is a horrible, horrible feeling.
What is wrong with people???
Oh, I am so sorry! Is there anything that the law can do about this? Or is it another one of those fun waiting games?
That is just terrible. It makes me sick.
Did you have to postpone the games for sunday? I mean are they willing to wait and not go anywhere else?
{{{{{{Mamapotomus}}}}}}}}
I am too far away to lend anything but positive thoughts and my ear to rant in. And that makes me even more upset.
The cop was totally useless. We found enough truck parts to surmise it was a Ford duelly (dooly? I’ve never had to spell that before…) truck. We found blue and white paint, four cab lights they knocked off, part of the front grill and bug deflector. The cop decided it was a stolen truck on a joy ride, but he didn’t mention if anything had been reported.
We’ve thought about kids that worked for us in the past. Anything’s possible- but most people who’ve met my husband have a “respect” for him. You know, the kind of respect you have for any really huge guy who really likes guns.
You have Keystone cops there too?
You mean to tell me that nobody would notice a truck that banged up. Or had reported it stolen if that was the case?
One the lighter side, do you think that when you have a bit more time you could give me some pointers? I want to take my husband out and give him a good run for his money. The one problem is that he was in the Army for 14 years.
I keep telling him I’ll whoop him anyway because women can be naturally deviant.
Back to the OP, if you feel the need to rant feel free to yell in my direction.
Oh, the event’s still on- I’ve got $5,000.00 worth of paintballs in my garage!
It just sucks to work so hard to make things look good, then when everyone shows up it’s trashed…
Oh, I am so sorry that that happened to you! How awful!
Hopefully your insurance will cover all of the damage.
I would nag the cops into doing something about it. Body shops keep records, and whoever did this will probably want to get the truck fixed, or, if it were stolen, when they find it, maybe someone will dust for fingerprints. (My aunt’s car was stolen once, and they didn’t do that when they found the car for some odd reason.) I would really make myself a pain in the ass to ensure that they investigate this incident, rather than just tossing it in a pile somewhere. Talk to the sergent, or the captian. Keep nagging until something is done. You’ve got to ride them hard and MAKE them do something about it. Threaten to contact the media about their piss-poor police work if they won’t.
Oh my, MamaP -
I don’t know what to say. That is just awful!
I hope they catch whoever did it and nail them to the wall. Just out of curiosity, have you had to kick anyone out recently? Like some teenaged kid who might feel the need to trash you place for revenge? Just a thought…
That is such an awful story! I really feel for you and your husband. I hope the tournament goes well for you, and that the police get on the ball and find out who did it.
Will this story be covered by your local paper? Maybe someone would come forward who knows something about a stolen truck (maybe they don’t realize it had been stolen).
We need to get several whips , round up a bunch of the Texas Dopers , hunt them down and horse whip 'em all. Those aren’t people, they are worse than animals, if they can’t eat it or screw it they destroy it !
Damn Mamapotomus, that truly sucks. I truly hope that someday the S.O.B.'s have someone do that to something they have poured their money, time , blood, sweat and tears into.
And while they stand there feeling like you do now, I hope they remember the day they did that to y’all !
As a Civil Engineer, I offer my services to rebuild your defensive fighting positions. This is right up my alley - revetements and firing positions. Lemme know if I can help. My bulldozers await.
Tripler
I’ll also castrate the bastards if you find them.
I’m very sorry–and pissed–to hear about the vandalism.
Having the lost truck parts is a start, and the fact that you’re in a rural area might make them even more useful. You might consider arranging all the parts for one photograph and include the picture on a flyer to be posted around the nearest towns. In the flyer you could could describe the vandalism and ask if anyone knows of a truck that’s missing those particular parts.
I’ve lived in enough small towns to know that even if people can manage to remain fairly anonymous (a tough enough trick), vehicles almost never do. Especially heavily-accessorized HotWheels owned by overcompensating dumbass kids (or childlike good-ol’-boys) trying to show off to each other. These shitheads don’t get big trucks and dress them up to avoid notice.
And if the truck was stolen, that’s easy to fine out. Stolen vehicle reports are part of the public record, aren’t they?
How disgusting! My heart goes out to you Mama! (Have I told you how much I like your screen name?) Be sure to get a Moulage (a plaster of Paris cast) of the truck tire imprints. Spade out a section of earth if that is what it takes. An expert will be able to tell you the exact type of tire that it came from. You may be able to get tire dealers in your area to help you trace the buyer of the tires. It is certainly evidence that you will want in any case. Plus, photos, photos, photos and more photos.
I hope that the weekend tourney turns out well. You may want a remote motion detection system with a short hop transmitter in place on the gates in the future. Please let us know how things turn out for you.
Last weekend, two teams got into a disagreement at our place. Team “A” occasionally helps us out at special events and such. Team “B” has a really horrible reputation, but we’ve always treated them fairly and have had no problems.
Team “B” are all family members who work for the family business.
A demolition company.
As we cleared away debris last night, we noticed that the strongest supports had been partially sawed in the middle- to facilitate the knocking down, I presume.
We can’t prove anything, of course. All of them drive nice, new vehicles but I’m sure they could gain access to a beater for the evening. Also, we don’t want to make any accusations- if they did this to gain revenge on another team, what would they do if they were angry at US???
Everyone, thank you so much for your kind wishes and great advice. We are going to call the cops back Monday to bug them about the new stuff we found. If that doesn’t work, I’m calling every news outlet in this town.
Zenster, thanks- have I mentioned how cool yours is? Ayesha, thanks for the hugs- I hope we get to meet in January- I’m looking foreward to it!
Why not phone around and see if any other sites have had problems with these persons.
In the UK the paintball world is fairly tight knit, something like this happens and ‘arrangements’ would be made.Word would get around very quickly about this team, likely be banned from virtually every site for a long long way around or from any competitions.
If you can spot any of them driving similar vehicles it might be enough to get all of them banned if there is a governing body for the local paintball league.
Put it another way, there is no chance that they would end up smiling - there are ways and means.
The tournament went pretty well. We had less teams than anticipated, but everyone had a great time and complimented us on how well the event was run.
We found out the damage was done to our field between 3:30 and 5:00 pm. Yep, broad daylight, facing a main road. Our neighbor drove along the back of the property looking for wolf tracks at 3:30- everything was normal. When he came back it was trashed. The neighbor thinks the landlord’s kids might have been involved, he’s seen them out there before partying.
I don’t know who’s responsible, but I’m sure they’ll get what’s coming to them eventually. I don’t want to try and get anyone blacklisted, because what if I’m wrong?
Thanks for all your kind words and thoughts… I truly believe that everything you do comes back three-fold- now lets hope it does for them!
