Don't Bring A Popgun To A Gunfight

Due to more business travel over the next three days, this will once again be a short week for the blog. Although I hadn't intended to post another story about how one more bank or credit union employee or customer in Missouri had used a firearm to take down a robber, my Missouri correspondents continue to send me inspirational stories from the land that Micahel Bloomberg forgot (or the land that forgot Michael Bloomberg), like the following.

A 34-year-old Missouri man was shot in the face Friday after he tried to rob a bank while wielding a toy gun.

The suspect, Michael Oliva, entered Security Bank in Trimble, Mo., Friday afternoon wearing a black mask and holding a realistic plastic gun replica, the police report states.

Mr. Olivia pointed the "gun" at a bank employee and demanded she empty her teller drawer. Not knowing the gun was fake, she dropped to the floor and began crawling toward another bank employee shouting for help.

The suspect pointed the fake gun toward the employee on the floor when another employee heard the cries. He retrieved his Smith & Wesson .357 revolver and fired two rounds at Mr. Olivia, hitting him once in the jaw.

A S&W .357 revolver: the Missouri breakfast of champions.

What did the robber intend to accomplish by tracking the bank emplyee who had hit the floor and was crawling away, to yell "Bang! Stop or I'll put the next one in your left butt cheek"? When you're armed with a "realistic looking" fake gun and your opponent is armed with a realistic looking real gun, the best thing to do when a bank employee calls your bluff is to drop the fake gun and run like your pants are on fire (which they may be in the next nanosecond). I'm not offering that advice as a matter of personal experience, just as a matter of common sense.

In the Show Me State, bank employees who pull a firearm to defend other bank empoloyees are not hounded by the authorities as they might be in more civilized states, where being shot in the face while trying to pull a bank robbery makes you the victim, one entitled to a boatload of sympathy and a nice financial settlement. Instead, they're accorded a hat tip from law enforcement.

The worker who fired the shot will not be charged.

"Anybody that does any kind of crime, breaks into houses or goes and robs anybody then basically they're taking their own life on the line," said Chief Larry Fish, Trimble Police Chief, in the Fox 4 News report.

Chief Fish sounds hopelessly unevolved. Exactly like most Texas lawmen.

Sooner of later, bank robbers in Missouri will learn that there are easier ways to make a living, like keeping Lindsay Lohan and Charlie Sheen clean and sober. Until they do, however, it appears that bank employees and customers alike will continue to "discourage" them from plying their trade.