Once I was on a weekend fishing trip hours from my home, and my wife called me around midnight, fairly shaken and frightened.............
At about 11:30 PM there was a knock at the door, very unusual for my home. My wife asked who it was, and heard a hispanic mans voice saying "I need to talk to you, can you open the door." She told him he was at the wrong house, and he just kept saying the same thing. She flipped on the extra porch lights and looked through the peephole at a hispanic man in his late 20's or early 30's, probably about 6' and 175 lbs. She told him to ask his question or go. She said that he looked visibly frustrated and his speech was slurred as he demanded that she "open the door so he could ask her a question." She peeped through the blinds and didn't see a vehicle. She told him that "my husband will be home soon, and you can ask him". She ran to the bedroom and grabbed her P239 9mm and ran back to the door. When she returned she looked through the peephole again and saw his shirt, he was trying to look through the small windows at the top of the tall 6 panel front door. She racked the action on the pistol loudly for him to hear it and told him that she had already called 911, and was prepared to shoot him if he didn't leave immediately. When she called she said that he had walked away from the door, but that the motion light on the driveway was still lit. I told her to double check the doors and windows, call 911, and call me right back, and that I would send a good friend over to check everything out. By the time my buddy got there the police had come by, and an officer that covers our neighborhood said that he was going to keep a close patrol around our block for the rest of the evening.
Skip forward about six months. A friend had told me to check out a registered sex offender website, pointing out how shocking it was just how many offenders were in any given neighborhood. You can actually click on a flag and see pictures of the offender, and what their charges were. So my wife and I are mortified and clicking through the profiles near our home. After clicking through a dozen or so, I click on a house about five blocks from ours, and my wife gasps, her voice trembling with emotion.........."That's the guy, that's the fucking guy that was a the door that night." He was a paroled attempted rapist, with more than one sexual offense on his record. We called the officer who had left his card that night. He came by and said he would check it out. The freak was living with relatives, and had skipped town when they found out he had violated his parole. This guy probably recognized that my truck was gone overnight. We live on a corner lot and are always out working in the yard. He had probably targeted my wife upon seeing her (she is quite a beautiful woman) , and then waited until only her vehicle was there over the weekend.
Since this day my family (including my 16 year old son) has loaded firearms strategically hidden in certain areas near phone handsets, and we have a very specific drill which we walk through regularly. My Son owns his own firearms and we shoot regularly. He understands that he is never to touch one of these firearms in my absence, short of an emergency. I suggest that everyone develops a plan for their family defense. If my wife were not armed and prepared to take this persons life without hesitation, there is no telling what kind of tragedy may have occurred that night. I shudder to think................
