The surveillance video used in the police investigation shows the two vehicles involved in the car-to-car shooting just before 7 p.m. on Sunday.
A black SUV and white sedan travel east along Beach Street toward the Embarcadero. As the black vehicle is stuck behind another car, the passenger in the backseat of the white sedan suddenly climbs halfway out the window and shoots at the SUV. It appears the driver of the sedan also sticks out an arm to do the same.
The video also shows multiple civilians running away from the intersection of Beach and Stockton with two individuals diving and ducking for cover behind a grassy median.
SFPD have arrested one suspect and detained another individual from the black SUV and report the occupants of the white sedan are still at large. SFPD believe there is more cell phone video of the incident and ask anyone with information to come forward.
On Tuesday, it was announced the Department of Justice (DOJ) reached a plea agreement with Hunter Biden, son of President Joe Biden, to avoid prosecution for illegally possessing a firearm as an admitted drug user.
Hunter Biden’s plea agreement to misdemeanor tax offenses allows him to avoid federal felony charges for lying on a background check form when he purchased a firearm. Hunter Biden was an illegal user of crack cocaine at the time, which made him ineligible to legally purchase or possess a firearm.
The punishment for the felony offense of lying on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Form 4473 is up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Not to mention, the firearm Hunter Biden purchased was later disposed of in a public trash can.
In a statement released by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the organization criticizes the agreement as it comes at the same time the Biden administration is punishing firearm retailers by revoking licenses and terminating livelihoods for minor clerical errors with its “zero-tolerance” policy.
“Under this administration’s ‘zero tolerance’ policy, licensed firearm retailers have had their lives destroyed for paperwork mistakes far less egregious than buying a gun when you are a crack addict,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF’s Senior Vice President and General Counsel. “They are not serious about reducing gun violence, only scoring cheap political points. It is worth noting this announcement came today, after President Biden’s appearance in Hartford last Friday to call for gun control.”
During the appearance, President Biden once again called on Congress to pass unconstitutional gun control measures that would ban an entire class of commonly-owned semiautomatic rifles and allow for suing members of the firearm industry.
The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms released a statement in response calling the deal “an insult to the intelligence of the American people.”
“Why should anybody respect any gun laws if the president’s son gets a pass,” CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb questioned. “The American public should be outraged at what amounts to a deplorable double standard.
“It is important to note that none of the gun prohibition lobbying groups have uttered a word of condemnation,” he continued. “This fact alone shows what hypocrites they are, and what a hypocrite Joe Biden is. Their silence is deafening.”
Gottlieb noted how President Biden has spent his entire political career campaigning for strict gun control, including bans on so-called “assault weapons” and more recently, an acknowledged effort to prevent the sale of 9mm pistols. But the rules evidently change when the president’s son is involved in a federal gun crime that would result in fines and imprisonment for up to 10 years for anybody else who knowingly lied about not being a prohibited person, to obtain a handgun.
“If Joe Biden wasn’t president,” Gottlieb said, “Hunter Biden would be heading to jail. Looks like the biggest loophole of them all is to violate a federal gun law when you’re the president’s son.”
The CCRKBA chairman also said the gun ban lobby’s silence on this case should erase any influence they have on the nation’s gun law policies.
“The anti-gun-rights movement, from Joe Biden on down through all of the billionaire-backed gun control groups have just lost whatever credibility they ever had, and ever will have, by not immediately denouncing this deal,” Gottlieb stated. “These elitist anti-gunners must never again be taken seriously by the public, the media or members of Congress and state legislatures when they advocate for tougher gun laws, while remaining silent about the Biden gun crime loophole.”
A North Carolina dad took action on Father’s Day when he fatally shot an intruder who had threatened his young daughter, according to local Police.
After receiving report of a breaking and entering in progress and shots fired, Wilson Mills police officers and Johnston County sheriff’s deputies arrived at the scene shortly after 9 p.m.
Joco reports talked to Police Chief A.Z. Williams, who stated preliminary investigations have occurred.
It appears the suspect had entered the backyard of the residence. He encountered three children playing outside and he targeted the 11-year-old daughter.
The other two children rushed indoors to alert their parents.
Shots Fired
The suspect followed the children and attempted to force himself into the house, violently shaking the door handle. In response, the homeowner took action and shot the intruder.
The identity of the 23-year-old suspect has not yet been disclosed.
The suspect was attended to by emergency personnel, but NRAreports indicate he died. Williams emphasized that the family had no prior knowledge of the attacker.
The homeowner fully cooperated with the investigating detectives and was not taken into custody, the sheriff’s office confirmed. Fox Newsinforms us that this case is being viewed as a self-defense situation.
According to ABC11, Williams noted that this incident is one of the rare violent occurrences during his five-year tenure at the Wilson’s Mills Police Department.
Be Prepared – Even on Father’s Day
An article fromHager & Schwartz tells us that violent crimes are most likely to happen during the summer. This statement cites multiple reasons, including heat and increased drinking.
Next, another statistic from the US Department of Justice informs us that “3 out of 4 people will become victims of a completed or attempted assault.” In other words, citizens need to always be ready and capable of defending themselves.
This father was put in a position to defend his children. He had prepared himself by knowing how to use his firearm, and he definitely put it to use that day.
This Father’s Day incident serves as a reminder of how important the fathers – and the guns – in our lives are.
How likely is an American to die in a mass shooting? It really depends on which measure you use.
According to Gun Violence Archive (GVA), across 646 mass shootings in 2022, 642 people were killed. That fact alone should already give you some indication of how they count these things – GVA defines mass shootings as any incident where 4 or more are shot, not including the shooter. As a result, their list is mostly gang violence incidents, many of which involved no one being killed, just injuries. According to Excel, the average is .993808 deaths per GVA “mass shooting.”
Anyway, even taking that 642 figure, that means the average American had a 0.19 in 100,000 chance of dying in a mass shooting in 2022. In other words, about 1 in 500,000.
But let’s say you aren’t a gang member, and are more concerned with what people actually mean when they say “mass shooting”. I.e., some lunatic walks into your grocery store, school, movie theater, etc. and begins a rampage. How likely are you to be killed in an incident like that?
The Mother Jones database is an excellent tool for that question. It limits it to incidents (1) where three or more are killed, (2) involved a lone shooter (with some obvious exceptions, like San Bernardino), (3) were carried out in a public place, and (4) gang-related crime is excluded. To be sure, Mother Jones’s measure still isn’t perfect. I do think some incidents where less than three are killed are still mass shootings by the common understanding of such incidents. But Mother Jones’s definition comes close to what most people mean when they say “mass shooting.”
By the Mother Jones definition, 74 people died in mass shootings in 2022. That’s about 0.02 per 100,000. Or roughly one for every five million people.
Mass shootings are tragedies that get massive media attention. But they are a very unlikely way to die, especially if you aren’t involved in criminal activity.
“Each weapon recovered could mean one fewer victim of violence!” Price gushed about an L.A. “buyback.” Charges against him, including for embezzlement and perjury, may be indicators of how believable his claims about anything are. (Curren D. Price, Jr./Facebook)
U.S.A. — “Democratic LA city councilman charged with embezzlement, conflict of interest in latest political scandal,” Fox News reported Thursday. “Curren Price is the latest member of the Los Angeles City Council to be arrested in recent years.”
Price is accused of voting to approve projects “in which he had a direct financial interest,” with his wife receiving more than $150,000 in undisclosed payments from developers, and of “having the city pay for medical benefits for his now wife while he was still married to another woman,” the story elaborates. All in all, he’s “facing five counts of embezzlement, three counts of perjury, and two counts of conflict of interest.”
So naturally, he doesn’t trust his constituents with guns, exploiting a so-called “buyback” with the Los Angeles Police Department to gain himself some free publicity while not making a bit of difference in the violent crime Angelenos live under (and bafflingly, vote for with their choice of “leaders”). It wasn’t his first.
“Certainly in South L.A. I feel that gun violence is the No. 1 public health issue,” Price said at a press conference for a 2017 event. “Buyback programs like this really underscore the importance of getting guns off the street. It’s just amazing the number of weapons that are turned in.”
Not that they do anything but fraudulently make it look like city “leaders” are taking charge. No less an “authority” than the National Institute of Justice has admitted:
“Buybacks are ineffective unless massive and coupled with a ban… 1. The buybacks are too small to have an impact. 2. The guns turned in are at low risk of ever being used in a crime. 3. Replacement guns are easily acquired. Unless these three points are overcome, a gun buyback cannot be effective.”
“Price is fighting to ensure our justice system works for everyone, not just the wealthy and well-connected,” his campaign website advertised, hitting on all the right “progressive” buzzwords to gin up resentment and stir up support for doing everything but address the real issues behind criminal violence.
“He has fought to bring more accountability reforms at LAPD to stop racial profiling and police misconduct, especially against young Black and Latino men. He’s led efforts to crack down on guns and successfully secured funding for at-risk youth and foster programs, gang intervention, and crime prevention. And he’s fought for investment in mental health, addiction treatment, job training, and education – not more jails and incarceration.”
“I am a firm believer in the control of guns, the restraint of guns, and the federal government’s proposal for the regulation of guns,” Curren told Our Weekly in 2013 in a report on the “Gun Culture on South L.A.”
But what about the other council members? The story says he’s “the latest” to be arrested:
“Mark Ridley-Thomas was found guilty of conspiracy, bribery, and fraud in March of this year… José Huizar pleaded guilty in January to one count of conspiracy to violate the RICO Act and one count of tax evasion [and] Mitchell Englander was convicted in 2021 of scheming to falsify material facts after he attempted to cover up lavish gifts and services he received from business interests.”
Are you ready to not be surprised?
“Ridley-Thomas also wants the group to explore options to better enforce existing and/or adopt stricter gun control restrictions and penalties… ‘especially related to sale or possession of semiautomatic guns and military-style assault weapons,’” The Daily Breeze reported. “He gave several examples of possible regulations, such as deeper background checks for gun sales, requirements for those who purchase guns to buy insurance to cover any taxpayer expenses incurred from the ‘injurious use of a gun’ or taxes on ammunition and firearms.”
“L.A. bans the POSSESSION of mags holding more than 10 rds. in city limits… People who currently possess such magazines, many for collectible firearms registered decades ago, have a 60-day window to remove them from the city, sell them to a legal gun dealer, or turn them into the Los Angeles Police Department.”
It’s really no wonder that such political predators don’t trust citizens with guns. Knowing you can’t be trusted means no one can be: It’s called “projection.” And it’s also called “survival instinct” when wolves demand “commonsense horn safety” laws.
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.
Bank of America Turns Over Information on Gun Owners to the FBI, iStock-471503379
WASHINGTON, D.C. —FBI whistleblowers have come forward with damning allegations against Bank of America (BoA). According to Representative Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), the banking giant has been revealing information to the FBI about its customer’s gun purchases without a warrant. Now the pair has sent letters to other banks to see if they also violated the privacy rights of their customers.
After the protest at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, Bank of America provided the FBI with a list of customers who made transactions in or around Washington, D.C., purchased a flight to the Nation’s Capital, or booked a hotel room in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. Most of Bank of America’s customers that attended the large rally never entered the Capitol Building, and the FBI did not have probable cause to allow the law enforcement agency to get a court order for the bank to surrender the documents.
When the FBI approached BoA about turning over the records, the bank complied without requesting a court order.
The megabank would put anyone in or around D.C. and purchase a gun on the top of the list. By simply being in or around D.C. on January 6 and purchasing a firearm using a BoA product, the FBI would mark you for investigation. The FBI investigated many BoA customers without a court order and with the full cooperation of Bank of America.
“In a transcribed interview, retired FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst George Hill testified that BoA, ‘with no directive from the FBI, data-mined its customer base’ and compiled a list of BoA customers who used a BoA product during a specified date range. Mr. Hill further noted that ‘on top of that list, they put anyone who had purchased a firearm during any date.’ Mr. Hill also testified that the list that BoA provided targeted transactions in Washington D.C., and the surrounding area,” the letter reads.
The letter was sent to JPMorgan Chase & Co, Citigroup, Truist Financial Corporation, Wells Fargo, U.S. Bancorp, and PNC Financial Services. The Congressmen are asking the banks to provide any documents or communications about the release of customer data from the January 6, 2021, timeframe to the FBI or any other federal law enforcement agencies.
This request is to see if the other major banks of similar size leaked the same customer information to the federal authorities that Bank of America released.
“Congress has an important interest in ensuring that Americans’ private information is protected from collection by federal law enforcement agencies without proper due process. The Committee and Select Subcommittee must understand if, how, and to what extent financial institutions, including PNC Financial Services, worked with the FBI to collect Americans’ private data,” the letter reads.
Many are concerned that the FBI is becoming overtly political and weaponized against anyone the Biden regime considers enemies. We have seen the weaponization of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) against conservative non-profits. The FBI has also used documents like the discredited “Steele Dossier” to get FISA warrants to surveil political opponents. Some of those concerned about the weaponization of government agencies are serving in Congress.
It should concern all Americans (not only gun owners) that big business is working hand and hand with big government. Instead of protecting its customers’ data, it turns it over to the surveillance state without a fight. Gun owners now know that Bank of America is not protecting their data from an ever-encroaching government. The only question now is how far the rot goes.
About John Crump
John is a NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people of all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, or at www.crumpy.com.
The American 180 was a drum-fed, selective-fire rimfire submachine gun originally intended for Law Enforcement applications. Note the empties pouring out of the bottom during this long burst.
It was November of 1974 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. While the weather in such places as North Dakota and Illinois was already abysmal, the legendary Florida sunshine still kept things warm and cheery. This day, however, there was some serious mischief afoot.
In the early seventies, the Chevrolet Camaro was the archetypal American muscle car.
The names of the two bad guys have been lost to history, though I have read that they were originally wanted for burglary. We know that they were stopped by Officers Mike Gilo and Gary Jones of the Fort Lauderdale Police Department while driving a flashy Chevrolet Camaro. In 1974 the gas crisis had not yet castrated American muscle cars, so the Camaro still had ample spunk.
Everything fundamentally changed when one of the suspects produced a handgun and began firing at police officers.
Things got tense, and Officers Gilo and Jones retrieved their long guns. In a veritable fit of stupidity, the passenger side perp produced a handgun and fired. Shooting at well-armed police officers seldom ends well.
With 11 million copies in service, the Remington 870 is the most popular shotgun ever produced.
Officer Jones leveled his issue slide-action 12-gauge shotgun and cut loose with a load of buckshot. The resulting cloud of 0.33-inch lead balls tore up the hot rod but otherwise failed to connect. Officer Gilo, however, wielded something else entirely.
The American 180 .22-caliber submachine gun was a unique weapon marketed primarily to Law Enforcement users.
Mike Gilo hefted his fully automatic American 180 .22-caliber submachine gun, jacked the bolt to the rear, and took a bead on the car. Squeezing the trigger he unlimbered a fusillade of zippy little 40-grain lead bullets at some 1,200 rounds per minute into the vehicle’s rear window.
The American 180 Submachine Gun
The philosophical similarities between the American 180 and the WW1-era Lewis gun are obvious.
The American 180 was an open-bolt, selective-fire .22-caliber submachine gun loosely patterned upon the American-designed and British-produced Lewis machinegun of WW1 fame. The father of the American 180 was Richard “Dick” Casull. His original Casull Model 290 was a semiauto .22 rifle that fed from an enormous drum magazine located atop the weapon.
The Casull Model 290 was an exquisitely well-made firearm. The receivers were cut from a big chunk of steel, and the parts were hand-fitted. Original 290’s are coveted collector’s items today.
The 1960’s-era Model 290 was both expensive and cumbersome. Eighty-seven hand-built copies saw the light of day before the project died a natural death. Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos owned one. However, by the 1970s other manufacturers in the US and Austria took up and built upon the design.
The massive .454 Casull was a ludicrously powerful handgun.
Dick Casull was a gunsmith from Utah who also developed the monster .454 Casull cartridge along with the big-boned revolver that fired it. The .454 Casull was basically a grotesquely up-engineered .45 Long Colt round that developed nearly 2,000 foot-pounds of muzzle energy.
North American Arms mini-revolvers are undeniably adorable. These are the guns you can always have on you.
Casull along with Wayne Baker also pioneered Freedom Arms in 1978 to develop miniature single-action revolvers. Eventually, North American Arms acquired the production rights and covered the country in a thin patina of these adorable well-built compact stainless steel wheelguns.
Technical Details
American 180 drums come in a variety of sizes and mount atop the weapon via a sliding catch. This is the view of the drum from the bottom.
The American 180 SMG weighs 5.7 pounds empty and 10 pounds loaded with a 177-round drum. Original magazines carry either 165 or 177 rounds, though larger capacity drums of up to 275 rounds are still in production today. 275-round drums effectively occlude the weapon’s sights. However, E&L Manufacturing, the current producer of American 180 drums, includes an elevated front sight along with your first 275-round drum purchase.
The drum magazine spins as it empties. The American 180 ejects out the bottom of the receiver.
The American 180 bolt incorporates a series of grooves in the sides to channel crud out of the mechanism. The British L2A3 Sterling submachine gun features similar stuff. The body of the drum spins on top of the receiver as it empties, which is kind of weird.
The American 180 shares any number of common characteristics with the M1928 Thompson submachine gun. The detachable buttstocks on both weapons function similarly.
There is a captive screw underneath the forward aspect of the receiver that allows the gun to break down quickly into two handy components. The stock removes with the push of a button like that of the M1928 Thompson submachine gun. The bulky pan magazine produces a cluttered sight picture, but the gun is just a ton of fun on the range.
The spring-powered motor for the drum is removable and must be wound properly before use.
You can die of old age while loading these drum magazines. There is supposedly a mag loader available, though I’ve never seen one. The process really is spectacularly tedious and is best executed in front of some Netflix. A single common spring-powered motor (the detachable mechanical bit in the center) can be used on multiple drums.
This ungainly monster reflected the state of the art in laser sights back in the day.
The American 180 was originally designed to be used in conjunction with a primitive bulky helium-neon gas laser designator. These early laser sights were enormous contraptions that ran about two hours on a single set of batteries. Oddly, there was also the option of operating the sight off of wall power. That would, of course, presuppose an exceptionally cooperative target.
This is the result of a single fifty-round burst fired from twenty meters.
A single .22LR round isn’t particularly awe-inspiring, but twenty of them in a single second will absolutely rock your world. Even at 1,200 rounds per minute recoil is inconsequential, so the gun is easy to control. The original marketing literature claimed that the American 180 would munch through concrete walls, car doors, and body armor. To eat through body armor with a full auto .22 necessitates a remarkably open-minded miscreant. The gun’s manufacturers claimed that you could place the contents of an entire 165-round magazine within a three-inch circle at twenty yards in the span of eight seconds. Wow.
Trigger Time
All civilian-legal automatic weapons are getting pretty long in the tooth. The last transferable machinegun was produced in 1986.
I found the gun to be finicky. However, the youngest civilian-legal machinegun in the registry is some thirty-four years old by now. None of these things were designed to last for generations.
The safety is a rotating lever on the right side of the receiver. The fire selector is an unmarked pushbutton located behind the safety. Pushing the peg to the right sets the gun on full auto.
The spring-driven motor for the drum magazine has to be tuned a bit. Too little tension and the gun chokes. Too much and the gun chokes. Get it just right, however, and the American 180 is every bit as cool as you might think it would be.
The non-reciprocating charging handle is located on the left aspect of the receiver.
Burst management requires a bit of discipline, but the onerous loading cycle serves to motivate. Given an adequately expansive piece of paper, you really could write your name with the thing. Take your time and hold your protracted bursts on a single spot, and the American 180 will indeed eat through some of the most remarkable stuff.
Both of these guns cycle at about 1,200 rounds per minute. The tiny little subgun on the left is an RPB MAC-11 in .380ACP.
Running the gun intimates an element of precision that is likely illusory at best. The lack of over-penetration in urban areas, when compared to centerfire offerings, was one of the biggest selling points for the gun. However, a gun that cycles at 1,200 rounds per minute is the stuff of nightmares if wielded in a slipshod fashion in a congested area. Truth be known this might not actually be markedly more hazardous than a 12-bore chucking buckshot, but both guns do demand a lot of practice for safe employment.
The Rest of the Story
A quick two-second burst chewed the back window out of the Camaro.
Though the 12-bore failed to connect, the 180 reliably did the deed. Officer Gilo unleashed a 40-round burst that took all of two seconds. These forty little rimfire bullets chewed through the back window of the car, and the car crashed in short order.
For certain narrow applications like neutralizing armed felons at close range in an automobile the American 180 was a superb tool.
One of the bad guys was already toasted, his critical bits thoroughly rearranged courtesy the prodigious swarm of little 40-grain slugs. His partner in crime fled the scene but was apprehended soon thereafter sporting an unhealthy collection of small caliber bullet wounds of his own.
The American 180 is a controllable little bullet hose. The backstop in this photograph is 65 feet tall and safe.
In the 1970s there were apparently not quite so many lawyers as is the case today. In an era wherein folks sue cops over some of the most inane stuff, I suspect a .22-caliber machinegun that rips along at twenty rounds per second would likely not satisfy any modern Law Enforcement agency’s risk management department.
Ruminations
The Utah Department of Corrections used the American 180 for a time as a prison weapon.
The American 180 was produced for a time in Utah and was formally adopted by the Utah Department of Corrections. The Utah DOC bought quite a few laser units as well. When wielded from a guard tower at their state penitentiary I suspect these puppies reliably kept the cons in line.
The American 180 inspired the Slovenian MGV-176 that became a fairly popular combat weapon.
The Rhodesian Special Air Service used a few of these weird little weapons operationally in Africa. A similar gun produced in Slovenia and titled the MGV-176 was purportedly fairly popular in the sundry wars that took place thereabouts.
There’s really not much an American 180 will do that a decent 9mm subgun might not do better, but it was undeniably novel.
It’s tough to imagine what the American 180 might bring to the table that a proper 9mm subgun might not, but it is nonetheless a thought-provoking concept. I personally wouldn’t be comfortable relying upon the cumbersome drum feed system in an austere environment.
Most of the commercial American 180 submachine guns went to Law Enforcement users.
The company’s marketing efforts focused on LE sales, and I recall their advertisements in gun magazines back in the Dark Ages. Like all legal machineguns, transferable examples command a premium these days. Many of the guns available to civilian shooters today were traded out of LE arms rooms as departments grew weary of them.
There was even a quad mount designed for the American 180 that produced some 6,000 rounds per minute. The gun’s advocates envisioned such a rig for perimeter defense.
The American 180 is one of the most unusual combat weapons ever imagined. Under controlled circumstances as our hapless Florida burglars discovered, the American 180 can indeed be devastatingly effective. At this point, however, the American 180 is little more than an historical footnote and recreational range beast.
With the stock removed the American 180 was almost compact. The bulky top-mounted drum prevents the gun from being readily concealable.
Loading drums would befuddle Job the prophet, and the gun eats ammo like a monkey after Sugar Babies. However, you’d be hard-pressed to conjure a more delightful way to turn .22 rimfire ammo into noise. Novel, unique, and oddly effective within its admittedly narrow applications, the American 180 is an artifact of the golden age of gun design.
Sound suppressed Austrian-made American 180 submachine guns were procured by the Rhodesian SAS during their sundry bush wars. There is at least one documented instance wherein a pair of these weapons was used to successfully engage FRELIMO terrorists at close range during an operation in Mozambique in 1979.
Detroit police officer in full uniform attacked inside gas station
By FOX 2 Staff
article
Detroit Police said two men attacked an officer in full uniform Saturday evening at a Detroit gas station.
DETROIT (FOX 2) – An off-duty Detroit Police Officer who was in full uniform and on his way to work the Taylor Swift concert was attacked at a Detroit gas station Saturday evening.
Detroit Police Chief James White said the officer stopped at a gas station on Joy Road around 5:30 p.m. on Saturday for gas and was in full uniform.
According to White, the officer was paying for his fuel inside the gas station when two men attacked him. One of the two was armed with a Glock, White said, and they were able to wrestle the officer’s gun away from him.
The officer fought back and they fought over the gun, which the officer was able to eventually get back.
White said the two suspects then fled from the scene and no shots were fired.
“Mama, sister, auntie, somebody turn them in tonight. We’re not going anywhere,” White said.
According to White, the officer was heading to work the Taylor Swift concert when he was attacked
The police were initially offering a $1,000 reward but upped to $5,000 just a few minutes later.
Detroit Police said two men attacked an officer in full uniform Saturday evening at a Detroit gas station.
This guy was an actual hitman. Aside from perhaps the tattoos, the fantasy versions we see in the movies bear little similarity to the real world.
It’s become a trope in movies and television. For reasons that I struggle to articulate we seem to be irresistibly drawn to stories about hired killers. The steely-eyed assassin who lurks in the shadows ruthlessly taking money to end a life is simply mesmerizing. We can’t look away.
Keanu Reeves’ John Wick does have an undeniable screen presence.
While Hollywood has served up countless stories orbiting around professional hitmen, John Wick is arguably the most compelling. Wick is a retired assassin formerly in the employ of the Russian mob in New York City. He has recently lost his wife to cancer. His prized possessions are a cherry 1969 Mach 1 Mustang and a beagle puppy that had been a gift from his deceased bride. Wick encounters a headstrong young Russian mafia figure at a gas station, and things go pear-shaped from there.
Leftist film reviewers called it gun porn or bullet ballet. John Wick established a genre of hyper-violent stylized chaos.
The upstart Russian and his thugs break into Wick’s house, beat him up, steal his car, and kill his dog. In so doing they awaken a sleeping giant. John Wick’s close combat skills are superhuman. What follows is 101 minutes of unfettered choreographed mayhem. John Wick: Chapter 2 came out three years later. John Wick: Chapter 3—Parabellum debuted two years after that. John Wick: Chapter 4 is due to hit theaters in March of 2023. I, for one, cannot wait.
John Wick is what most folks think of when they ponder the persona of the professional assassin. The real deal is a good bit different.
Keanu Reeves’ John Wick fits the expected stereotype. He is fast, calculating, ruthless, and unkillable. He has extraordinary hand-to-hand skills and packs absolute state-of-the-art firepower. John Wick is a cold-hearted killer enraged by the loss of the things he loves. However, it turns out that John Wick is just a movie. Out here in the real world, contract killing is seldom quite so tidy.
The Philosophy of Death
Nobody who actually does what this guy is purported to do ever turns out normal.
We are not really designed to take human life. For normal people who might fudge on their tax deductions or cut the tags off their mattresses, cold-blooded murder is a bit of a red line. Those who actually engage in such stuff do so at a terrible emotional cost.
Most people suffering from Antisocial Personality Disorder end up here or worse.
Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) is a complicated medical malady diagnosed via a discrete set of pathological behaviors. Distilled to its essence, those with ASPD have an inability to empathize with the pain of others. They are essentially born without a conscience. Most folks with ASPD end up in prison or dead. It’s a bad problem. However, there are actually those who monetize their malady. ASPD can be a useful tool if your job involves killing for cash.
The Making of a Monster
This guy looks like a normal-enough Joe. He wasn’t. Andrew Veniamin was a stone-cold killer.
Andrew Veniamin went by Benji. Born in November of 1975, Benji came of age in the Australian community of Sunshine, a suburb of Melbourne. His parents were Greek Cypriot immigrants. He served as an altar boy in the St. Andrews Greek Orthodox Church. Later evidence suggests that his early religious training didn’t really take.
Benji Veniamin’s was a driven personality. He also had a wicked temper.
Veniamin was a gifted boxer. He trained relentlessly five days a week and was a compulsive runner. Though he only weighed 110 pounds when he boxed, he was considered quite competitive. However, as he grew older Benji came to see crime as a more lucrative career than professional boxing.
Benji Veniamin’s curious mental illness manifested at a young age.
When he was young, Benji Veniamin worked in the West Melbourne wholesale fruit and vegetable market. As near as I could ascertain he was never married, but he did father a daughter. His peculiar emotional malady ensured that he had criminal convictions for both theft and assault in short order.
Carl Williams, the big guy on the left, gave the hitman Benji Veniamin a steady job.
Like most folks with his problem, Benji gravitated toward the kind of places his particular skills were considered valuable. He began a steady association with the Carlton Crew, a notorious organized crime ring active in Melbourne starting in the late 1970’s. Through this organization, Benji developed a close friendship with local crime boss Carl Williams and his wife Roberta.
Roberta Williams, now ex-wife of the mob boss Carl Williams, likely had a thing going with the family assassin.
People with ASPD can be inexplicably charming. That and, for reasons I will never comprehend, attractive women frequently find psychopathic nutjobs irresistible. Along the way, Williams’ wife Roberta developed quite a fondness for Benji. As a mob enforcer with access to the gang’s leadership and their families, Benji routinely delivered the Williams daughters to their religion classes every Tuesday before bringing them home and supervising their baths. The youngest daughter Dhakota held Benji in particularly high regard. There were allegations that the relationship between Benji and Roberta went a bit beyond regular reliable childcare, but those details don’t matter. What really characterized Benji’s professional life was the way he exercised his peculiar mental illness.
Bloodbath Down Under
This guy could emotionally go from zero to sixty in an instant. He had a fulminant anger problem.
In addition to a lack of conscience, Benji was prone to emotional outbursts. At one point Benji and a childhood friend harbored affection for the same girl. As the details came to light, Benji shot up the man’s house, set fire to his parents’ home, and threatened to murder the guy’s sister to bring the conflict to a head. By mutual acclimation, both men eventually agreed to settle their differences via a good old-fashioned fistfight. The friend later testified in court, “A friend of mine promised me that there’d be no guns, as long as I brought no gun as well…I promised him (Veniamin) I’d bring no gun and he promised me the same thing. He just stood there until I got close to him and then produced a gun.”
After all that buildup, before the fight could even begin Benji simply shot the other man in the leg and declared victory.
Though a fairly small man by any objective standard, Benji Veniamin was full of fight.
On another occasion, Benji approached a local nightclub accompanied by friends. When two large and imposing bouncers attempted to prevent his entry the physically smaller hitman beat them both senseless. Such stuff earned the wiry little man an outsized reputation.
It really didn’t help if you were Benji Veniamin’s buddy. If he was ordered to kill you he just took care of business.
Despite his obvious skills as a chauffeur and nanny, Benji Veniamin was first and foremost a hired killer. His targets could be total strangers or intimate friends. If directed to take a life, he did so without apparent remorse. This was a marketable skill in this particular place and at this particular time.
Dino Dibra was Benji’s mate and business partner, right up until he got in the way of the hitman’s plans.
By 1999, Veniamin and a school buddy named Dino Dibra were running a lucrative marijuana racket and netting a fair amount of money. Whenever others would attempt to muscle in on their business, Veniamin simply shot them. Throughout it all, Veniamin developed an enthusiasm for both the lifestyle and the product.
Apostolos “Paul” Kallipolitis was a boyhood chum of Benji Veniamin, and then Veniamin blew him away.
In May of 2000, it was alleged that Benji shot and killed a local businessman named Frank Benvenuto as he sat in his car. Five months later he killed his business partner Dino Dibra after a disagreement over control of the business. Two years after that he killed another childhood buddy named Paul Kallipolitis over something or other. His reputation grew to the point that he was eventually paid $20,000 NOT to kill a man who offended his brother.
The relationship between Mick Gatto and Benji Veniamin was warm and cordial for a time.
Benji eventually developed a professional relationship with a proper villain named Dominic “Mick” Gatto. Gatto had been a competent boxer himself in his youth before becoming a successful and wealthy businessman. Along the way, he developed an intimate association with a variety of criminals. These relationships supposedly substantially enhanced his commercial success. Gatto was known to make generous charitable donations to children’s causes. It was said that Benji looked up to Gatto and viewed him as a sort of father figure.
The Hitman’s Demise
Australia’s 1996 gun confiscation netted some 650,000 weapons.
By this point in Australia, the private ownership of firearms was strictly controlled. In the 1990’s the Aussie government enacted blanket gun confiscation that disarmed most law-abiding Australian citizens. These laws unsurprisingly had little effect on Melbourne’s organized crime gangs.
This is the S&W Model 10-5 that Benji had on him when he was killed. He preferred wheel guns for their absolute reliability.
Benji Veniamin was by now a seasoned shooter. He told friends that he favored revolvers to autoloaders for wet work for their innate reliability. It was therefore a four-inch Smith and Wesson Model 10-5 .38 that Benji had handy as he met with his boss Carl Williams and his buddy Mick Gatto at the La Porcella restaurant on March 23, 2004. I have found Australians to be fairly casual. On this fateful evening, Benji had his wheelgun concealed underneath a pair of shorts and a t-shirt.
This is Graham Kinniburgh. They called him The Munster, for obvious reasons. A dispute over who killed him led to conflict between Mick Gatto and Benji Veniamin.
Rumors were swirling that Benji had killed a friend of Gatto’s named Graham Kinniburgh. In retrospect, it turned out that he had nothing to do with this particular gangland slaying. Veniamin called Gatto over to a quiet corridor behind the kitchen so they could have a private conversation on the subject. Benji’s epic temper manifest itself, and the conversation grew heated.
Mick Gatto has been described in print as a George Clooney look-alike. I don’t see it myself. They both have gray hair, but then again, so do I. I seldom get mistaken for George Clooney myself.
Benji drew his weapon intending to kill Gatto, and the two former boxers struggled for the gun. From the subsequent trial transcript: “I never seen where he got it from but he pulled a gun out and that’s when…I had hold of his hand with both my hands and I sort of pushed it towards him and…I forced — he had his hands on the trigger and I just forced his hands — squeezed his hands to force him to pull the trigger. When I pushed the gun towards him and I was squeezing his hand he sort of pulled me off balance and I nearly fell over on top of him and the gun was going off. It was just bang, bang. I’ve got to be honest, I thought I was a dead duck. I thought I was gone.”
Benji Veniamin died both young and hard. His boss Carl Williams, manning the casket on the front right, was a pallbearer.
That all sounds pretty fishy to me, but I obviously wasn’t there. Regardless of the particular circumstances, five rounds were fired. Benji was hit once in the head and twice in the neck. He bled out on the spot. The contract killer responsible for at least seven known murders died as he lived at age 28, in some ways a victim of his own unfortunate disease.
