Little Problem at my local Trader Joe’s
 

And by “little problem” I mean that the gates of hell have opened. Active shooter, hostages, the whole nine yards. :(

Standoff at Trader Joe's in Silver Lake after gunman opens fire; he and bystanders inside store

I’m not there but this is where I shop at least twice a week. I buy all of my groceries there and at the Gelsons across the street. This is normally the safest place on earth unless you are afraid of granola hippies. I’m in shock.

"...granola hippies."
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LOL...I love it. It captures them perfectly.
The ones who head for the bulk bins and graze as they pretend to be shopping. :)

weird when it's that close to home, I would imagine.

It’s totally surreal. Apparently a domestic dispute from South Central LA that turned into a pursuit that happened to end there. Crazy.

And one of the baddies shot his g/f in the car prior to fleeing.
Someone wants to go be with Jesus.

My wife goes there all the time and we are 10-15 min away. I buy sandwiches from that Gelson's for lunch if I am working up in Los Feliz. Crazy. YOu are right, its very safe there.

After shooting his Granny at home before the car chase.

I don't think this guy is going to get to be with Hey-Zues. I'm pretty sure he's goin' to hang with el Diablo, and not the one made by Lamborghini.

I'd like to see the cops plug his sorry ass.

You know, I hate to have to state the obvious, but I will anyway - an armed citizen or two at this scene could have changed the outcome dramatically. Just recently, we had an (illegally) armed lunatic in a Walmart parking lot. Two legally armed citizens put an end to his lunacy in very short order. They killed him.

In that neighborhood, it ain't gonna happen. More then likely someone will approach the gunman and ask if he's has a bad childhood and offer talk about his feelings.

In LA too? I thought that would be more in my neck of the woods.

What do you want to bet that the lady that was shot in the store, and died later, was actually shot by the police, not the suspect?

I hate to state the obvious again, but these people have made their choices. They need to live with them until they make other choices. In the meantime, when the unthinkable, the impossible, comes to their neighborhood, they will just have to cower in place.

In the meantime, as a responsible adult, I've made other choices. If or when the SHTF while I am in my local grocery store, things may or may not work out for me. I do feel, however, that I have at least a marginally better chance than some idiot hiding behind the turnips, just then learning to pray.

The woman who was killed was an innocent caught in the crossfire during the initial gunfight between the cops and the suspect when he crashed the car. All of the armed citizens in the world could not have prevented it. No one else was killed and this guy will likely never breathe free air again. It would have been better if he’d been killed but at least he didn’t mow down any pedestrians during the pursuit.

It did occur to me that if I’d been trapped in the store, which absolutely could have happened, I’d wish I had a concealed piece. That’s once the hostage situation happened.

Still, this was a 1 in a billion situation. I’m not going to carry a gun on me everywhere I go for that chance. Don’t want to live like that.

You and I both, Dannis. I don't own a gun, but not oppose to gun ownership. I just just see the damage in a crowded stores like that if a few by standard open fire trying to shoot the shooter. How many more are going to die in the cross fire or mistakenly kill by the police thinking they are the gunman.

I don't go grocery shopping with a sidearm. Never have, never will. I don't want to live like that either.

Continuing to beat the dead horse, however, my state - Washington - is a "shall issue" state. California is a "may issue" state. As such, there is not a snowball's chance in Hollywood that anyone in any store down there is ever going to be armed. Not even a consideration for a perp. Non-issue. Whereas here, in Washington, a perp has an excellent chance of meeting someone who chooses to be armed when shopping. Whether or not that would give one pause, I can't say.

I can say, however, with certainty, that up here it is my choice. Not some eff-tard gubmint bureaucrat's with no abiding interest in my safety. I do want to live like that.

Had to laugh. You hit the mark. :)

I hear where you’re coming from but just to keep it real, California has 58 counties and probably most of them are easy to get a carry permit in. Just not the ones w large metropolitan areas, which I’m fine with. It’s up to each county Sheriff’s office who they issue gun carry permits to. In L.A. County, you need to have a compelling reason like owning a jewelry store or regularly transporting large amounts of cash to get one. THousands of people w Security Guard licenses can carry, not hard to get one of those.

Secondly, nothing would have “given pause” to this guy. He’s a pissed-off teenager who lost the plot completely, shot his grandmother and GF, shot it out w Police and he could have crashed in front of the Police Station or a gun range, (yes, we have them here), and he would have kept shooting. The idea that he was calculating that no one was possibly armed inside Trader Joe’s is ludicrous. The last thing on his broken mind. He was shooting it out w the cops at the time.

There may be rare instances where some “good guy w a gun” can smoke some homicidal maniac out in public but this ain’t a good example for that argument.

So what happened to the freak? Dead or in custody?

Just read........he surrendered.

He pussied out and surrendered. We had a guy kill a cop a couple days ago, and he was shot dead yesterday. No burden on the taxpayers to house him, provide him a defense...

"He pussied out......."
~~~~~~~~~
My first thought.

Guy will most likely be sentenced to the Culinary Institute rather than jail!

Where is Judge Dredd when we need him?

Don't think so. The list of crimes he committed is long with aggravation. They will add up to some long time in the tank.

He will get life or the death penalty, which unfortunately is never carried out here. This ain't Texas.

At the Vons I shop at a few years ago some guy trying to evade the sheriffs, for whatever reason, ran into the store. A half dozen cop cars show up and they start pulling out their shotguns in front of the store. A number of dumb asses walked past the cops with their guns out and attempted to enter the store, I was walking out quickly and yelled at them.

If you carry on a regular basis, it is no different than putting your pocket knife in your pocket. It took me a while to get used to it, maybe a year or so.

We recently had a serial killer in Houston. Until last fall, his residency for the last 25 years was "Huntsville", the worst of the worst. He murdered 3 people, shot 2 others. Strangely enough, he gave up without a fight. He was simply robbing the victims, most for under $50.

He will be dead, about 2-3 years after his conviction.

When I first moved here to AZ in Sept. '10 I carried a belt holstered FI .380 all fall and winter.
Then in spring as I began to wear sweat pants instead of trousers, I'd just drop a little Beretta .22 into my pocket...sometimes even into my shirt pocket if it was closable.
Both became a habit and unnoticeable after a while.

Hey Don, did you ever feel unsafe in socal(I think you are from here) or did you feel so unsafe in AZ so you decided to carry a gun daily? I am just curious. I have never felt unsafe in LA or even S Central when I have to go there. I only went there maybe few times in my life until I got a job there for 6 months after college. Still, I never felt the need to carry a gun to protect myself. My dad's was in the jewelry business, and never felt the need to have one neither.

Never lived in SoCal...SF Bay Area. Never carried there...unless I was out touring on a moto.
In AZ I started to carry because I could.
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My first week here I was in line at a Walgreens drug store and looked down to see a 1911 strapped to a guys leg.
I thought, "I like that." I felt safe all of a sudden...not even having a clue that prior to seeing his .45 I felt unsafe. Wasn't even on my mind at the time.
So I started carrying. One of those 'you never know' things, I guess.
I was raised with firearms as a mere prat...survival training in the military so firearms have always been like a tool to me...second nature.
I could easily be one of those who pops a perp in a restaurant , etc.
I know myself...so no question.
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Haven't been to a range in over a year, however. Shame on me.
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Edit: BTW, lots of businesses around here have posted...No Firearms Allowed.

Thing is, if you're that guy who just happens to be in the wrong place at the right time, (or however you want to put it), AND you get a clean shot at some bad guy, (or the drop on them), it might work out into a story w a happy ending.

The young lady who got killed @ Trader Joe's was the manager and it was truly one of those "when your number is up" situations, i.e. there is nothing that could have saved her. She may have been shot by the police, in which case I feel incredibly bad for the cops.

It was one of those chaotic situations that unfolded in seconds. One second you are walking back into the store on a perfect Southern California day, the next second you are dead on the ground. Just bizarre and tragic.

^^^
Yeah, Denis. Ya never know.
That's why it's always good to never spit, swear, or lie. Always be on the good side of life.
What a world, eh?

Horrible situation. I feel bad for everyone involved, except the monster.

I probably lost 30 pocket knives before I gave up trying to carry one. Most of them were in the back of my night stand, from the many times I forgot to put them in my pocket when I got dressed. I'd have a couple dozen keys to my truck in there too if I didn't have to have them to drive the truck. I can't keep track of my cell phone.
No way am I going to carry a sidearm.
I know my limitations.

A complete stranger standing next to you with a pistol strapped to his leg made your unconscious insecurities conscious and then melt away. If this same person in this same line had his pistol in his hand (is that markedly different than on his leg?) what would your feelings be?

How are your feelings different than reality?

Other than my wife likes to shop there, I usually just sit in the car and check out the reasonably young things in their yoga pants.

The body camera footage from the LAPD officers is intense: :eek:

(Sorry for the ads): https://abcnews.go.com/US/officers-showed-calm-pressure-dramatic-caught-camera-trader/story?id=56787074

I'm not anti-cop but it looked like they just rolled up and started shooting randomly into the store from across the street. I know they were being shot at, but seems like they could have backed off until they knew if there were innocent people inside