This is *after* initiating court proceedings!
The initial victim showed a great deal of constraint. Had it been me that got "gut-shot" and then wrestled the gun away from the person that shot me, I would not have hit them over the head with it...I would have emptied the pistol in them, at very close range.
I apologize for being so crude, but I don't take kindly to being shot...it brings out the worst in folks.
Years ago one of my mentors had an alteration with a neighbor. Long story short, his neighbor, who was possibly schizophrenic and had made inappropriate comments about my mentor's daughter, was asked to stay away. He shows up unannounced and words were exchanged. The neighbor produced a .44 and shot my mentor and friend twice. He went down in the mud and fumbled for the 1911 .45 he carried, found it, and it jammed. The neighbor turned the weapon on his wife just as he cleared the jam and he emptied the clip into the guy. By pure luck the National Guard was in the area on a training mission and they were able to land a chopper and fly both to the hospital. The neighbor died on the way to the hospital, but not before telling the troopers that it was he that initiated the incident, absolving my friend. Mentally unstable people and guns seem to make for a really poor combination.
Any of God's creatures will fight when they feel they're cornered and threatened, no matter how slim the odds of survival. I've noticed many, many times property owners getting extremely agitated when they feel like someone or something is threatening them. The majority of the time it's over some very, very small areas, like less than a foot. I've seen quiet and pleasant 70 year old retirees turn to "beast mode" in a matter of seconds.
Sometimes we have to "tippy-toe" through a proverbial diplomatic minefield to get a survey complete. My point is we really don't know who is mentally unstable and who isn't. Actually all of the "crazies" I've run into are usually just a bunch of noise. Similar to unfamiliar dogs, it's the ones that DON'T bark at you that you need to watch the closest!
Keep your head low and stay near good cover, the whole world out there is packin'...
I'll second the don't bark comment. It's pretty easy to calm someone down who is already blowing off their steam. The person who has decided on a course of action and is in the process of carrying it out is the dangerous one. I am dealing with one of those right now. A 70 year old lady is sneaking over and spray painting random items on my clients property. Now she has taken to removing pins. The weird part is she is polite and quiet when they run into each other.
Bottom line is we need to be able to differentiate between crazy and dangerous in this business...
Years ago we had a guy call for a quote on a mortgage loan closing survey on a vacant lot in a subdivision, ended up getting the job. We go out, do the survey, flag the corners, turn out a plat and get paid, all cut and dried, no problems yet. We always did work orders and the one he signed clearly stated what we were hired to do. There were multiple check boxes listing ALTA, topo, utility location, house stakeout, etc. and all they selected was mortgage closing, which naturally includes all boundary work and location of improvements.
About a month later we get a call from a contractor, wants a copy of the topo to go with the engineer's site plan for the housepad and then wants to know if we will rough stake for the house, so he can clear. Huh??? I pull up job info and tell him apparently they had hired someone else to do the topo and he needed to contact the client for the updated information.
About 15 minutes later I get a call from a very distraught woman who wants to know exactly what all we did. I went over it with her item by item, including walking her through what was shown on the plat. She became increasingly angry, claiming for what she paid it should include everything survey related right up to the final survey once the house was complete. I tried to explain to her our price had been based on what her husband had requested and by his signing the work order understood that was all they were getting. The call ended with her saying she just needed to call her attorney and expect a call from them later in the day.
An hour later the attorney does in fact call, someone we had worked with many times, and I sent him a voided copy of the survey and copy of the work order. He calls me back, said he would discuss it with the husband and get back to me.
That night at home I get a call on the company cell, is the husband and apologized for his wife's actions, said he had indeed used another company that regularly worked for the engineer and architect that were doing the site plan and sorry for all the hoopla.
The next morning the wife is waiting at the front door when I get there to open up, had to dial 911 and get a police car there to get away from her. When they got there I was locked inside my truck with the windows up and she was pounding on the glass screaming at the top of her lungs. When she first approached me she had a backpack in one hand and a purse in the other, when she hit me with the backpack it had something rather heavy inside, which turned out to be a loaded revolver once the police got the backpack away from her.
I found out later she and the police were no strangers, and part of the reason they were building a new house was because of restraining orders from two of her neighbors.
She wasn't crazy, as they had money, but she was definitely bat**** eccentric.
I met a new client on jobsite one morning and found this 4ft10in 80lb woman with flamin red hair dressed in pokadots, DFW metroplex girl in the woods.
She had the paperwork explaining what she needed, it was to combine a dozen one-half to one acre lots into one tract.
The original division of lots was something I had worked on from day one and here 10+yrs later it was going to be a walk in the park finding monuments, setup and get a remote location and start laying the missing ones out.
Went to the truck to fill my pockets with flag and grab the shovel and pin finder.
When I looked for her she was standing there with a stainless riot shotgun complete with extended magazine and pistol grip and a shoulder bag full of shells.
Apparently she had been run off the last time when a neighbor turned some pitbulls out on her and she had to make a run for it.
She made it clear that I did not have anything to worry about and that she had my back......
She was on point and ready to blast all the time we were there and was disappointed that no dog showed......
Mentally unstable people are my biggest fear as a land surveyor. I have no desire to get shot or killed for a dispute over someone else's property, and I take threats very seriously.
I got a call today from a nice lady wanting to know if we had a crew working near her house. I don't have any crews working on Boundary right now. She said that they found the trees along the back of her lot flagged up. She said that her husband noticed a strange truck parked near their driveway and that when he opened the garage door to investigate they drove off quickly backing up so they could not see the plates. I recommended that if she sees them again to call 911. The consultants that work for us are required to have the company name on their truck and to wear an ID Badge.
