[Abundy]

I responded to a domestic once, and unfortunately (or fortunately, as it turns out) was on the scene before the other officer responding. I observed a verbal argument between three individuals that appeared to be about to turn physical. I got out of my vehicle and approached them (they were standing on the sidewalk in front of their house) with about 15 people watching what was going on. As I approached them something made me look to my left and I observed an individual running up the sidewalk with a single shot shotgun. He was obviously agitated about something and was screaming at me and at the three people. He was holding the weapon with both hands and it was down below his waist pointing towards the houses. I drew my service weapon and began to circle backwards to my right to put parked vehicles between myself and this person. I was yelling at him to drop the firearm and he just kept running at me, yelling all the while. I was able to get the front of a parked car between us and the idiot bent at the knees, dropping down behind the fender. I told him if he stood up with anything in his hands I'd shoot him (he was approximately 8-10 feet away). Thankfully he left the shotgun laying on the grass.

Turns out the shotgun was the first firearm his deceased father had given him, so he didn't want to drop in on the concrete. Seeing me draw down on their relative (he was related to the individuals involved in the domestic) defused the argument between the other three. The family were all frequent flyers at our department and the kid with the shotgun had gotten into an argument with his mother who promptly kicked him out. He left with the shotgun but returned when he saw me arrive because he thought I was going to arrest one of his family members and planned to interfere.

The backup officers all said they would have shot him after the first three commands to drop the gun....guess it was a good thing they arrived late.

I've been involved in 5 or 6 incidents such as this where I would have been cleared if I would have shot a suspect - but I never fired my weapon due to good training, a calm head and common sense. Wonder why the FBI has so much trouble, I was just a lowly local cop - you know, the kind held in such contempt by the Feds.

[Cap'n Crunch]

You hit on something there. When guys say "I would have shot." Well, until your in the situation you don't know if your going to shoot or not.

Of the close calls I've had I just didn't think it was the right time to shoot, I did'nt feel threatened enough; and two of the three I almost shot were coming towards me with knives. And I did have an incident with a man with a shotgun also. (you start to forget over the years)

Theres a huge gray area there but I think you have to wait until you at least see a weapon.