People Are Telling All About The Time They Were Held at Gunpoint

In 2007, I was driving home after work. A vehicle in front of me was all over the road, acting drunk. A family member of mine was killed by a drunk driver when I was very young, so I have zero tolerance for that behavior.

I went to get this idiot's license plate number but they decided to slam on the brakes and come to a complete stop in the middle of the road. All 4 doors opened up and several people came running at my car. I started trying to turn my car around, but the driver managed to get both of his hands on my sill.

He reached in with a knife and tried to slash at me, but I stomped the gas, spun the car around and knocked him over in the process. When I slowed back down thinking I was safe, the maniacs came flying up behind me and slammed into my rear bumper. Thankfully, I was driving a fairly fast car and was able to escape. I called the police who showed up and unfortunately did nothing.

What I recall is time feeling like it was moving slow. My face felt flushed. I could feel my heartbeat in my chest and throat. Adrenaline hit hard and I was not prepared or used to it. My hands shook, I felt like I was shivering. I was also much smaller then, and honestly rather wimpy too. I felt like I had zero control over the situation. *Since then, I have had many other situations where the adrenaline hit and was far more prepared since I had experienced it before.*

In 2010, a burglar tried breaking into my house through the window above my bed. The curtains were drawn, so he couldn't see me. I'm a light sleeper. I quietly got out of bed, reached under, and pulled out a certain large semi-auto .30 cal rifle and pointed it at the window. As soon as the burglar lifted the shade, I flipped on a flashlight and smiled.

The guy panicked so bad he slammed his head on the window, dropped his flashlight and ran into the woods screaming the same word over and over. I got a free Maglight out of that deal. Yep, adrenaline was pumping and I couldn't sleep for the rest of the night.

In 2011, I had a car in a performance shop. The owner, who I had known for years, was going through some bad times and got into drugs. He was actively stealing parts from customer cars and selling them for drug money.

A friend tipped me off and told me to get my car out of there ASAP (my engine alone was $30,000, not to mention everything else- it was a 7 second car). When I approached my friend, the owner, and told him I needed my car and receipts for everything, he spun in his chair and sternly asked "are you calling me a liar?"

I said "No, I just need my car and want proof of the work done. I need receipts for everything." He opened up a desk drawer, pulled out a .357 and placed it on his lap pointed at me with his finger on the trigger.

He then said "You need to get off my property right now." I was a bit shocked, but I was prepared for the adrenaline hit. I nodded, turned around and left. As soon as I was in my car, I went nuclear. I hit the highway as fast as I could. My face was probably beet red with anger. I wanted to go back and fight fire with fire, but fortunately two friends and a family member stopped me.

A few of us went back together and I got the car out- turns out it was sabotaged though and I had to sell it for a disgusting loss. All I recall from that day is anger. The adrenaline hit, and I was at least more prepared, however the emotions still flared.

The common denominator is adrenaline. The first time it hits you hard, you simply aren't prepared. So many of us (myself included at one time, I'll admit it) play videogames, watch movies, and think you'll be the next John McClane, John Wick, or whomever else. The fact is, the first time you find yourself in a life/death situation, the adrenaline hits so hard you wind up being a shaky mess.

I used to be an excellent marksman, in a controlled environment. Given the adrenaline rush, I doubt I would be anywhere near as good. You have to learn to deal with the adrenaline and control yourself.

Username: [deleted]

I've been robbed at gunpoint 3 times. I used to work at a small wine shop/liquor store a while back. The store was in a relatively nice, quiet area of town, and catered mostly the middle-class, white people in the immediate neighborhood. One Friday evening, it was nearing closing time.

A couple regulars had stopped by within the last hour, but otherwise the place was dead. Just to pass the time I was watching Cops on TV. Then a guy opens the front door, and peeks his head inside and asks me what time it is, and when we close. I told him that we'd be closed in about 15 minutes, and he left. I thought nothing of it, and went back to the TV.

5 minutes later same guy burst into the store, wearing the same clothes, but had a bandana pulled up over his mouth, and pointing a pistol in my face. Shit. He said the usual "gimme all the fuckin money!" Instant panic.

Time slowed down. Thoughts raced. Ears rang. Eyes welled. Mouth dry. I just hit the "No Sale" button on the register, and stepped back as the drawer opened and told him to take it. He laid a grocery bag on the counter, and told me to fill it as he pointed the gun at me.

I told him again to just take it, that I wasn't helping him any more than opening the drawer. So he put the gun down and reached over the counter to pull the cash out of the drawer. I had a moment to think of how much damage I could do to him with a pint of Maker's Mark or Grey Goose which was kept behind the counter, but I'm no hero. He was gone in about a minute. The longest minute I've ever experienced.

Two weeks later I was again working at the wine shop. It was nearing closing time again, and a couple of my friends had stopped by to hang out. We were the only three people in the store when the front door swung open, and in barged the same guy from before. He was still wearing the same clothes and bandana. Same gun, too. Dumbass. He again screeched for the money.

I don't know if it was because I wasn't alone, or because this was becoming all too familiar, but I didn't panic. Stepping back from the register I told him to go for it. Fumbling across the counter he smashed buttons desperately to open the till.

I glanced across the counter to my buddies, one of whom was starting to tense up, eyes trained on that gun, and I could tell he wanted to take the guy down. I slowly shook my head. Seconds later the perp was headed to the door. Again, no heroes tonight.

Three weeks later... I'm at home in a house on a large university campus with three other dudes. Being on campus we partied a lot, and the neighborhood we lived in was mostly happy-go-lucky college kids. The only real crime was underage drinking, and the occasional burning couch in the street.

Anyway, I had gotten home from a long day, and was ready to call it a night. I went to my room, locked the door (because who can trust a house full of college dudes not to fuck with you while sleeping?) and went to bed. Oh yeah, I had a cousin from out of town who stopped by, and was staying on the couch. Next thing I know, four dudes in ski masks break down my bedroom door.

My first reaction was, "Goddammit, motherfuckers! I'm trying to fucking sleep! Take your drunken asses out of here!" Then, I see the guns. WTF?! I was so confused. I sat up. One guy walks to the side of my bed, slowly presses a shotgun to my head, and tells me to get up, go to the hall, and lay down. I was terrified.

This was much different than before. I guess it was the shock of being violently awoken from my own bed. In the hallway I see my roommates and my cousin laying face down, and one of the guys in the ski mask was tying everyone up with phone cord. I could hear my cousin whimper. Once on the ground, and tied up I again felt the barrel of the shotgun in my back.

A voice roared and then echoed in my head, "Where's the money?!" I told him I didn't have any money. He told the other guys to search the whole place all while leaving his gun pinned against my back. I thought I was going to die. I wanted to ask him why they were doing this.

I wanted to ask him to spare my life, but I couldn't get the sound out of my throat. It was like when you're having a bad dream, and you want to yell, but you can't. I was terrified. 5 minutes later, after they turned the place upside down, they were gone.

I quit my job at the wine shop two days later, and moved out of that house at the end of the month. Funny story about the liquor store is that it had never been robbed before or since I had worked there.

Username: TangyWaffle

I had a band with some friends a few years ago. We practiced in a storage unit that we rented. The facility was full of 'odd balls', ourselves included, and a lot of other bands. One day we were standing out in the road because somebody had stunk up the unit.... you know what I mean.

A truck came flying through the facility and nearly hit us all. We barely made it out of the way. He came so close to us that his tire ran over my buddy's shoe lace. It was scary and we we're pissed. So we yelled various obscenities at him.

The driver stomped his brakes and squealed to a stop. He got out of his truck and threatened us repeatedly. Needless to say, 5 of us, 1 of him, we we're not backing down. We weren't looking for a fight, we we're just really pissed off and couldn't understand how this person whom we had never met could be so violent towards us.

He drove off to his storage unit and we cursed him as we went back inside of our own. We were still a bit shook up obviously. I proceeded to get back to practice with my friends as we hear him yelling at us as he comes around the corner, this time carrying a rifle. My friends froze. One ran to the back of the unit. The angry man raised his rifle at us and said that this (his rifle) was why we shouldn't fuck with him.

Here's the thing. I was not frightened. I didn't move, but it wasn't from fear. I watched him as he got closer, close enough to punch in face! And I thought about it. I didn't try anything though. Mostly because I was worried that if I struck him that he may accidentally shoot the gun and injure one of my friends. I think that was wise in hindsight.

I waited till he was done yelling and spitting and I said, calmly, "fuck you". That was it. He didn't appreciate that. So he pointed the rifle at me, inches from my nose and yelled "shut the fuck up!!!". I said it again, "fuck you". This time calmer and as I stared him in the eye. The man began to shake from anger.

I think I knew he wasn't going to shoot. It was clear that wasn't his intention. Maybe that's why I wasn't afraid. I just couldn't believe how violent and terrible someone could be to complete strangers. I wanted to hit him. I wanted to take the rifle from his hands and bash his face in.

He managed to mumble one more phrase before he turned around and left, "not another peep". So as he lowered the gun and turned around I said it again, "fuck you". It made him snap back around but he didn't raise the gun again. He just looked at me with this terribly angry face. I knew then that I had won this standoff. He wanted to scare me/us.

He wanted someone to fear him and make him feel superior. And I wouldn't give that to him. We do not have the right to threaten the life of another person. He turned around and started walking away again and let out some loudly childish groan.

Minutes later we heard the tires from his truck as he drove off. We got the plate number and called the police. They didn't do anything.

They argued about which county had jurisdiction since we we're apparently so close to the county line. Then they said they could probably charge us with criminal mischief for standing in the street. The cops we're bigger assholes then the angry man.

Before they left, after doing nothing, one called me over to his squad car and told me that I made a terrible choice to not shut up, that I could have been shot and what about my mother and my family and my friends and all that shit. He attempted to scold me as if I was a misbehaving child.

He did this as he "ran my name", you know, cause checking to see if a person that has just had a gun pulled on them has any outstanding warrants is protocol.

He gave me back my license and asked if I had learned 'my lesson' from this. I stared at him wondering whether to say yes.. and then I calmly took my driver's license and muttered "fuck you" before I walked away.

Username: senornerd

A few years ago I was working in a grocery store in Florida as a stock clerk. It was a normal Tuesday morning; I was in the process of rolling a float of applesauce out of the backroom when I heard screams from the front of the store. Something like "She’s got a gun!!!" I kinda froze not sure what to do. I watched as people started franticly sprinting out of fire exits screaming, it was utter chaos.

Still not knowing what was going on, I felt like maybe I should be doing something like guiding people out of the store, but honestly it was empty at that point anyway. I turned and began walking back the way I came through the backroom.

As I pushed through the swinging double doors I heard a set of gun shots go off and decided my current pace wasn’t really doing it. I ran through the backroom and out the back of the store, as I did a group of cops with ar15's and Kevlar vests went storming past me.

Out on the back dock were a few employees including my very shaken up meat manager. He franticly asked me "Did you see her? Arunua, did you see her?!?" I said no, not sure why he was asking about the seafood girl who had been fired the day before.

Arunua, a 5' 1" Philipino lady who lost her job over threatening a fellow employee for telling on her, had returned to the store to take revenge on the employees and managers who she felt responsible for her losing her job.

The meat manager had been the one who told her she no longer had a job so he was a big target on her list. That morning she woke up, put on an all black sweat suit, packed her husband’s glock 17 and 6 clips of 9mm ammunition into a green re-usable grocery bag and headed to my store.

Arunua had worked at that location for about 2 years, I had spoken with her on a handful of occasions, like everyone always says, She never gave any indications that she would ever do anything like this.

She got to the parking lot around 10am and sat in her car. About 15 minutes later, Greg (the employee who she felt was at fault for her firing) walked out of the store and to his car, to enjoy a cigarette like he always did.

Arunua knew this ritual of his very well, they used to go and smoke out in the parking lot together. As soon as he got in his car and lit a cigarette, she walked up from behind him, pulled out her glock and shot him in the side of the head.

Walking towards the store she realized he might have survived a single shot, and decided to go back and shoot him twice more in the chest. Feeling satisfied, she placed the gun, finger still on the trigger, inside of the grocery bag and headed into the store.

She made her way up the employee stairwell and walked through the break room where a few people were sitting enjoying their break, not really noticing the crazed murderer passing through. Not seeing anyone she wanted to punish, she moved on to the managers offices.

Luckily for my store manager, he was at another location for a meeting (a meeting that saved his life). Angrily she went to the next office over saw the store file clerk and demanded to know where the manager was, she told her the manager wasn’t in the store.

Not believing her main target wasn’t there, she ran back down the stairs and down onto the store floor. She walked the store, convinced the file clerk had lied, that the store manager was there. She turned the corner and saw the meat manager, standing behind the meat counter.

Pulling the Glock out of the bag she opened fire on the manager. He dropped down to his knees and crawled out the back door. At this point everyone in the store heard the shots and began running for the closest exit, including me.

A pair of detectives ran up from beside her, stopped behind some shelves for cover and demanded she drop her weapon. She quickly turned and began firing at them, one bullet coming close enough to hit the gun holster of one of the detectives.

After trading fire for less than 30 seconds, Arunua was hit once in the chest and twice in the lower abdomen. Somehow, even after sustaining three bullet wounds she managed to survive. Her trail was a few months ago, she was charged with first degree murder.

Username: rdalea

OK. This is a very true story. Happens to be somewhat disturbing and funny....Here's the scene. Date night in East Texas in the late 70's, either Friday or Saturday, don't remember.

It was really late and I had been driving my parent's car to maybe prom or some other pretty nice high school function. I was coming home very late after having spent time with my girlfriend after said event. The roads were basically empty. I knew I needed to get home fast because: parents.

So, at one intersection I basically cut the red light out of the driving by taking a diagonal right, cross cutting through a business parking lot. This higher speed (not particularly dangerously high speed either) combined with a low transition to the parking lot, the cornering and a battery not secured in the battery tray of that 1971 Pontiac LeMans, caused the battery posts to contact the fender, which caused a short.

So, the car's electrical system is basically non-existent while the battery welds itself temporarily to the fender, and drains. As I know now, but didn't then, I escaped serious injury because that battery did not explode. Not sure why, but that is NOT the point. It didn't.

I learned about how much hydrogen gas is in a battery and what that can do when ignited in that situation much later when a roommate blew up a battery in our living room, but that is another story that I have difficulty believing actually happened, but did.

Back to date night and the Rent-a-Barney Fife. I got out, lifted the hood, knocked the battery loose (dumbassery, but Darwin was on a smoke break or something) and shut the hood. Tried to start it, but nothing.

SO....the business whose parking lot I was in was nursery. Lots of VALUABLE plants, I guess....and there was a security service vehicle, like a repurposed police sedan, cruising in the back of the lot around shrubberies and the like. I suppose that is where the really expensive flora is?

I was, for a 70's teen, dressed to the nines. Polyester shirt with big tab collars open low on the chest, gold chain dangling, 2 inch loafers, tight polyester pants low on the hips held on with a very wide patent leather belt.

I could have been the redneck version of John Travolta, not intending to be, that was just the style of that era. But, I go waving the security guys down in the nursery area, and one of them emerges with the ever intimidating 12 gauge pump shotgun.

One rack later and the gun is pointed at me about 10 feet away. I was too mad at being stupid for making the car stall, which was making me late to get home, to be scared by a dumbfuck $3/hr derpa-derp pointing that stupid hole-maker at me.

And, growing up in E. Texas, I was completely used to seeing and handling/shooting guns of all kinds. So, not scared, just pissed off at the guy.

I remember thinking, and still think, "Why are you pointing a shotgun at me? Look how I'm dressed for God's sake. Do I look like someone here stealing plants?" It was ludicrous for so many, many reasons. But they guys called the police to handle the shrubbery disturbance.

Mostly, I should have been scared of that shotgun and the fucking idiot pointing at me the entire 20 minutes it took for a cop to show up. Or maybe the battery nearly exploding in my face and burning me or possibly blinding me or both. But I was neither.

The police did however respond to the "OMFG: There's a HUGE robbery going on at the nursery" call. He listened to my story, laughed off the security guys' behavior, gave my car a jump to start, then gave me the "You need to go straight home, boy" talking to in a stern voice.

I drove home without further incident but DAMN....a 12 gauge pump Mr. Rent-a-Cop at a nursery????? Why? Just WHY?????

Username: 2020HammersandNails

I've had a gun pulled on me on 3 different occassions. Once I was held at gunpoint in Tulsa Oklahoma and had my cash register emptied out during a 3 person raid on a grocery store at closing time. Another time I had a gun aimed at me by an overzealous police officer in Denville NJ.

Apparently my car matched the description of one owned by someone who had been stabbing people with a screwdriver. The third story is much more involved but I will try to condense it a bit.

I believe it was May 1997 in Tulsa Oklahoma. I was in the high school band and had dressed up in a suit for a performance downtown for Mayfest. I parked my car in a parking lot several blocks away from the event and managed to follow the crowds to the right area. After the show I hung around for a bit and decided to head back at around one in the morning.

I'm walking down the street trying to find my car and at this point there are only very sporadic groups of people roaming the streets. I see 2 guys approaching directly in front of me and I put my head down a bit as I go to move past them. I feel a strong nudge in my chest and I'm pushed back a bit.

One of the two says "money". I looked him in the face and for a second I think its one of my friends messing with me. That thought fades almost instantly when I see the gun he's pointing at me. I noticed that his friend is smiling like he thinks that this is the must hilarious thing he's ever seen.

He had a Cheshire cat grin and was twitching a bit. I took the 4 dollars I had left, threw it in his face and ran faster than I think I have ever or will ever run in my life and managed to duck a corner. I can hear one of them laughing.

So I keep running, looking for a police officer or anyone that can help. I think I was in shock. Finally after a solid 5 minutes with nothing but the sound of my shiny dress shoes slapping the pavement I manage to stumble on a mobile police station being packed up prior to being stored. I tell an officer what happened and he barely played any attention to me. He was having a conversation with a couple young attractive women and I had interrupted.

He relayed my robbers' description into the radio and then asked the two women if they wanted a ride to their car. I told him I was lost and couldn't find my car either but he ignored me. The three of them hopped into the patrol car and sped away. The mobile unit was also once again mobile at this point and I was alone again.

I walked another block further from where I was robbed and managed to find a payphone in front of a seedy bar. I tried to collect call my mother to come and get me but she wasn't picking up. After trying again several times I gave up and called my grandmother. I told her that I was robbed at gun point. I told her I had spoken to the police and gave her my location.

And so I sat down on the curb and waited til someone came to pick me up. After a while I was approached by a couple prostitutes. One of them was extremely nice and was worried about me being out there at this time of night.

I broke down a bit to be honest. As I'm telling her what all had happened to me I see my mother's car approaching at an insane rate of speed. She slams on the brakes and says "get in the car, NOW!!!!!!".

The conversation with my mother went like this
Mom - what do you want to do!!!??
Mom - do you want to turn yourself in?!
Mom - you should turn yourself in
Me - what are you taking about?!
Mom - Don't play stupid with me, your grandmother told me what happened (she breaks down sobbing)
So you robbed a police officer at gunpoint and then ran!?? What are we going to do? Did you shoot someone??!

I was so relieved that I started laughing and then explained what actually had happened. We ended up laughing and crying the entire drive home. She explained that my grandmother had told her that I had robbed an officer at gunpoint and fled to the bar.

When my mom arrived she saw me sitting on the curb next to a scantily clad prostitute with tears in my eyes and a wild look on my face and assumed the worst.

Outcome - every time I park my car in the city at night now, I actively look for landmarks.

Username: Gliese2

My cousin worked for Domino's Pizza. He gets a delivery to a trailer park in a not so friendly part of town. He carries with him pepper spray for protection, since Domino's doesn't allow you to pack heat. He arrives at this trailer and its getting dark.

He told us that he felt weirded out when he arrived, since it seemed like no one lived in the trailer, but before he could turn around a 14 year old kid walks out from the back of the trailer, yelling out to him saying "Pizza man!" So he stops and walks towards the kid.

The kid tells him, the front door is broken, so to follow him to the back door, so he can get his money. My cousin obliges and not thinking anything of it.

Soon as he walked around the corner, a beer bottle smashes right into his face. He was hit so hard, his teeth were knocked out and glass was embedded in his skin. He falls to the ground and more beer bottles are smashed unto his face. He finally stumbles up bleeding all over his head and sees 3 kids (14, 17, and 18 years old) just laughing it up.

He tries to fight them off, but he's dazed and losing blood. They hit him with 2x4s and dropped concrete blocks on his legs, while kicking him all over. He can barely move and the oldest kid pulls out a gun, but the 17 year old tells him not to shoot him here, since people can hear.

So they pick him up, barely alive, and threw him in the back of the trunk of his car. They drive off and he can hear them talking about where to go to dump his body, so my cousin even though he was pretty much tortured, waited till he heard the car stop at a traffic light and pulled the emergency latch and jumped out of the car. He runs out screaming his lungs out hoping that someone can hear his calls for help.

HELP HELP HELP!!! He's screaming, crying, and running like hell even though he can barely move. The kids finally see him running and got out of the car and started running after him. They manage to get to him and proceeded to beat him and tried to drag him back into the car.

A state trooper sees what happens and bolts to where they are. The state trooper pulls out his gun and tells them to back the fuck up and get on the ground. He radios for back up and paramedics. He sees my cousin on the ground crying and barely alive and my cousin hears him yelling at the 3 kids, "You Goddamn animals!" We get a call from his mom at around 4am and we all rush to the hospital to see him.

Broken ribs, eyes bleeding, nose broken, face pretty much fucked and broken, glass embedded everywhere, all his front teeth are fucked, legs are broken/fractured and double in size, his back is filled with embedded glass, lip busted in half, huge bruises everywhere etc.

Everyone in the room is crying. His brother is mad as hell and we have to calm him down and have to keep him from leaving because I know what he's capable of. It took a year to heal physically, but it took years for him to finally cope with what happened to him.

He used to be scared of car trunks for awhile and would just cry when he tried to unload groceries from his mom's car. Now he's doing great and making the best of his life. The kids? The 17 and 18 year old were sentenced as adults and got life sentences and the 14 year old went to juvenile hall.

Domino's paid less than $55,000 out to my cousin for pain and suffering (my cousin sued dominos because they were dicking him around about paying all his hospital bills... 55,000 was for pain and suffering);

Actually he got like $35,000 minus lawyer's fees.), they tried to wiggle their way out of paying all his hospital bills too, but they paid it all. They didn't cover therapy sessions though, that all came out from his mom's pocket. Fuck Domino's.

Username: drasticm0use

Cleveland, Ohio, January 1973. Just arrived from California on a plane. My senior citizen aunt & uncle picked me up from a bus stop. It was getting dark and had just started snowing. They had the kind of narrow garage where everyone but the driver had to get out of the car first and the driver pulled in. My suitcase was in the trunk.

As my uncle squeezed out of the car, and I prepared to open the trunk, I heard a voice behind me say "alright, give it up". I turned to 2 men approaching. The one with a gun pushed me face down into the snow and put the gun to my head and cocked the trigger.

Now THAT is an unmistakable & unforgettable feeling! I began to visualize a tiny newspaper article that read "California man killed in robbery". He moved toward my aunt, who was a lovable but feisty woman who used a cane.

I turned my head toward her in time to see that she was measuring the guy with the gun for distance while tightening her grip in preparation to swing. I shouted (while still laying kinda sideways in the snow) "don't do it aunt Ruth, don't do it!"

Luckily, she backed down as he pushed her down and snatched her bag. My uncle appeared paralyzed and didn't say a word or do anything at all. I believe he was in his late 80's or early 90's at the time. The second robber tore my new leather jacket off me as the gunman pointed the gun at my head again.

The robber with my jacket patted me down looking for my wallet, I suppose but I was wearing pants that just had slits up near the belt line so the pockets were not easily visible.

Seconds later, one man backed the car out of the garage, the other got in and in probably 2 minutes they were gone with the new 1973 Chevy Impala, my suitcase, my aunt's purse and my new leather jacket.

Cleveland PD showed up maybe 45 minutes later. While they were taking a statement from me as I sat in the back seat because it started snowing very hard. They got another call and refused to let me out of the car.

That's when I discovered that police cars don't have door handles in the back seat. BTW, I hadn't yet even made it into the house because both sets of house keys were stolen along with the purse and car keys.

Maybe an hour or so later PD brought me back to my aunt & uncle's house but the entire time I was treated as though I was a suspect and not a victim. I was repeatedly asked why I was coming to Cleveland in the middle of winter from California (where it was about 75 degrees when I departed SFO that morning) and what were the contents of my suitcase.

About a week later the car was found 4 blocks away, completely stripped. I should mention that my whole purpose for going to Cleveland in the first place was to drive my aged aunt back to California so she wouldn't have to endure another fierce winter in Cleveland. If I had to do it again, I certainly would because the long, harsh winters were really wearing on my beloved aunt Ruth.

Upon our arrival back in California, I returned to school and one of the courses I took required me to write about my life experiences. My story, "Welcome To Cleveland" earned me an A+.

Username: eman282828

I was 19 years old, living in one of the safest, yet sheltered suburb of a major city known for its crime. At the time I was working at a 24 hour gas station while attending community college so I was put on the late shift.

I remember only having a few hours to go on this dark February evening before I could go home to my warm bed, when a customer walked in. I was sitting down at my laptop and when I heard the door open, I got up to greet the customer; instead was told not to look at them.

I remember thinking it may have been someone who was disfigured and embarrassed to be out in public. Immediately after that thought finished, that’s when I saw the pistol tucked into the waistband being flashed at me. “Get a bag and put the money in it.”

I complied and grabbed one of our tiny paper bags and started loading it with the cash from the drawer. This is my first reality gut check and I cannot recall what was going through my mind at this exact moment, but I would venture to say it was a form of malicious compliance.

What I did after putting the cash in the bag, I started loading the change too. I don’t know what compelled me to put heavy rolls and loose coins into this fragile paper bag, but I did.

Bag sitting on the counter for the perp to take, the next words out of my mouth we’re, “anything else?” in good customer service fashion.

“Cigarettes,” said the perp. “What kind?” I ask again because customer service.

Again, I start cramming this poor paper bag with more rigid, bulky items and after a handful or two packs of cigarettes, I start to hear the bag tear. Perp must have too because that’s when they said enough.

“Get on the floor and count to 100,” demanded the robber.

This is when my gut check became a donkey punch. I remember feeling so helpless and scared that I was going to be shot into the back of the head, but I complied in hopes that I would make it out. I begin counting aloud as I hug the floor.

At about ‘4’ I hear the door open, then close. No tires squealing, no loud, running footsteps, so, still counting aloud, I groundhog myself above the counter to check the mirror to see if I was safe. Indeed I was.

This gas station has an auto repair shop attached to it and the cashier’s booth is within it; separated by a metal door. I crawl outside to the service manager’s desk and use their phone to dial the police.

While waiting for them, I realize that none of the other customers know what happened and they are getting mad that I am not authorizing the pumps for post pay. That was surprising to me because my earth was just shattered, yet life was still going on as I trembled under a desk.

The police get there in what seems like hours and I was questioned about the details of the robbery and I answered to the best of my limited knowledge. Unfortunately because the gas station didn’t have any cameras or any other means of identifying the armed robber, the perp got away.

I later returned after a short leave but became so unsettled, that I moved to a different job within months.

Username: PM_me_them_D-cups

I have a story that will probably get buried. When I was in college, a lot of my church friends were playing an over the top version of the game Assassin.

You know, that game where you are supposed to “kill” (generally with a squirt gun) one of your friends that is also playing the game while simultaneously being “hunted.” I was not playing, but I was always hanging out with the people that were playing.

Anyways, I caught a ride to Wendy’s with a friend who decided he was going to get his target while they were eating (I just wanted a spicy chicken combo).

So my friend takes an old black t-shirt and wraps it around himself like a ninja mask and stalks around Wendy’s with a small super soaker that he had spray painted black (super bad idea). He ends up getting his target while I sit in the car eating my food.

At one point while waiting, I see an employee in the drive through staring at me, so I waved as politely as I could. He quickly shut the drive through window and ducked. I should have guessed something bad was going to go down.

So, my friend gets back to the car without incident. And as we are pulling out of the parking lot...the lights and sirens turn on. Once we pulled over, a little confused (obvious in retrospect), we hear over the loud speaker of the cop car “put your hands in the air.”

So we sit there in car with our hands held up for what seemed like 30 minutes as the cops waited for back up. Then the cop gets back on loud speaker

“With your left hand remove the keys from the car and throw them out the window.”
My friend does it.
“With your right hand open the car door from the outside.”
My friend does it.

“Step our of the car with your back facing us”
My friend still had his seatbelt on and said quietly “my seat belt.”
The cop then very aggressively says “I SAID GET OUT OF THE CAR!!”
My friend franticallt responds “MY SEATBELT!”
To which the cop replies, “take off your seatbelt....”

So once my friend gets out of the car they ends up giving him directions to walk backwards towards them. This is when I turned around and saw a cop with his gun aimed at me. This prompts the cop on the loud speaker to say

“Turn around.”
I turned around very quickly.
I knew that we didn’t do anything wrong or at least I did not. So despite being frightened I knew that I just had to follow the cops orders and then wait for an opportunity to explain myself.
The cop then says
“Move to the drivers seat”
I loudly reply
“Seatbelt!”

Then in the most exasperated tone I have heard
“Remove your seatbelt...”
I comply.

When they tell me too, I get out of the car and walk backwards toward them following their order precisely. After they cuff me one of the cops gets in face about robbing a Wendy’s.

To which I explained the situation. They found the squirt gun and gave my friend a warning after they verified everything and we were free to go.

Morale of the story is that bank robbers do not wear seatbelts.

Username: mro0001024

This is one of the stupidest things that I've done and should be a lesson to not get too drunk, be aware of what is going on, and just have a fucking brain when you are out.

Back in college in NYC, I went out and got shit-faced with my friend. She introduced me to these two guys she said she was "friends" with.

The bar was closing up and she tells me they have weed on them, and we should go back to her apartment and smoke. Taking her for her word, I go "OK! Great idea" because what could go wrong?

As we are stumbling back to her apartment, she leans over and whispers, "I have no idea who these guys are!" My blood almost ran cold at that point, but she insisted everything was fine; that she knew them through person xyz or whatever.

We get up to her apartment, and we are all sitting around. One guy takes out a gun from his pocket. He had it wrapped up in a cloth.

So he carefully unwrapped it then held it up to me, laughed, and after a few moments of facing my own mortality, he told me it is unloaded. My friend asked to hold it. She was laughing hysterically, waving it around. I was frozen in place.

Why the fuck does he have it? Who the fuck are they? Drug dealers, right? He put the gun away, and I was racking my brain for how to get out of this situation.

He leaned over and tried to tickle me which is like the grossest ever. I told him I'm not ticklish, he took that as a cue to try some more, and then I snapped. I stood up and said, "Look you guys should really get out of here."

My heart was racing a mile a minute. He started screaming asking why I was being such a fucking bitch. Oh, and side note, my friend is passed out asleep through this all. I just kept repeating you need to go, you need to go, and trying to usher them through the door. I think I was in survival mode maybe?

At that point I had kind of shut down the fear I had because it was already a pretty bad situation, and I didn't want my friend or me to get raped. It was good that he was getting so mad and worked up though because I am sure neighbors heard it.

I got them out of the apartment, but then they started yelling up from the street below about how they were going to kill us. That we were white bitches. Really pleasant stuff.

I woke and told my friend to get down on the ground because her apartment was this really old rent controlled apartment in the west village with HUGE windows and shutters that she had wide open (also on the second floor).

I crawled on the floor from window to window to close each of them without being seen or within shooting range from the street. We were both huddled on the floor in her bathroom the rest of the night to be safe. They got tired of yelling at us after a few minutes and disappeared though.

In retrospect, I am proud of myself for having the courage that I did and also really confused as to why we didn't call the police.

Username: 999papercranes

I was a total geek in high school. I was a Member of the National Astronomical Society, just in case there wasn't another good reason to get beat up. I just got my license and my friends and I were going to White Plains Illinois State Park with a trunk full of telescopes for the Perseid meteor shower.

It's summer time and late enough to start getting dark, so maybe 9:00 PM? I'm almost at the park and an Illinois State Trooper starts following me. I'm driving my mom's black 4 door Buick special and the trooper is RIGHT on my bumper.

My license is only a month old, I've never been stopped before and I'm pretty clueless. After a few minutes the trooper turns on the big red bubblegum light (this was 1970, no Mars lights yet) and pulls me over.

He has the spot light right in my eyes and tells me on a loudspeaker "DRIVER, GET OUT OF THE CAR". I opened my door and stepped out, pretty scared because I don't know what I did wrong - but it must have been real bad if this is happening.

It was two troopers, one older, one young. Maybe the young guy was being trained? The older trooper was the driver, he was out of his door with the microphone in his hand and said "DRIVER, WALK TOWARDS ME".

I started to walk to him and was at my rear tire when my dumbass friend Steve decided 'Hey, I know, I'll get out and talk to the cops too!'. Without being told he opened the passenger door and stepped out.

As soon as his foot hit the ground both troopers drew their firearms and screamed "FREEZE". I did, right by the tire, literally with one foot in the air. I'm about 30 feet away from this trooper and all I can see is that giant barrel pointed right at me.

I'll never forget it because it was maybe 2 feet across? I will also never forget the sound it made when he cocked it. I have no idea how I didn't wet myself.

The younger trooper is screaming at Steve "GET BACK IN THE CAR!, SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!" Stuff like that. I'm not watching what's going on with that, all I can do is start at that giant barrel. The older trooper carefully came closer and demanded "What are you doing out here!"

I tried to talk but all that came out of my mouth were squeaks. I managed to blurt out a few 'meteor shower', 'telescopes' and such while I stared at that gun.

It's hard to talk when you're so scared you can't breath. By now the younger trooper has decided Steve and my frineds are about as threatening as a box of kittens and he said to the older trooper "It's just a bunch of kids".

The older trooper uncocked and holstered his firearm, looked at me and said calmly 'Son, why don't you put your foot down?' That's when I realized my foot was still in the air, right where it was when he said freeze.

The older trooper told me to take a walk with him. He told me there was a armed robbery of a convenience store by some men driving a black 4 door sedan. The store owner had been violently beaten, that's why they pulled me over.

He's asking me questions about meteors, telescopes and such. I'm pretty sure he didn't care about any of that, he was just making sure I wasn't going to drive until the adrenaline was gone and I wouldn't put mom's Buick in a ditch.

Steve was getting an earful from the other trooper on what to do and what NOT to do if the next time he's stopped by police.

When they let us go the older trooper told me to get in the park, set up my telescope, then kick Steve's ass because he almost got me shot. Thanks Steve!

Username: klatu4245

I've been pretty fortunate to not have this happen in a malicious sense. But, there was one time that requires some backstory for context as to why I would do something so stupid as to get caught at gunpoint in the first place.

I was in the middle of a layover from hell at MSP (for the unaware, that's Minneapolis-St. Paul airport) en route from visiting my friend in Kansas City and heading back to Buffalo.

This was Christmas Eve, so things were incredibly busy and annoying, and as someone who doesn't do well with large crowds, the situation alone was irritating, let alone other factors

-- adding to the problems was the fact that I had gotten an hour's sleep the night before (the flight from Missouri left at 8:30 the morning before --

MCI is on the east end of the KC metro, while my friend lived in Olathe, which is on the west end of the metro, so we had to leave at 5:30 AM).

The two factors, combined with my frustration over an increasing amount of layovers because of a snowstorm over Illinois, made a perfect storm for hazy thinking on my part.

When I landed at MSP, I knew I had a three hour layover, so I went out of security to smoke a couple cigarettes.

After stalling for a bit (until my supposed departure time was an hour or so away), I walked back into the terminal, went back through security, and went to my gate to hang out until the flight left. As I waited, I realized that I couldn't find my prized necklace that my friend gave me.

Panicking, I figured that I'd left the necklace in one of the bins when I came back through security and had to take it off. I walked back to the security gate I'd passed through, and started approaching the TSA people from *inside* the terminal.

Out of nowhere, all of these alarms started going off, and about four Minneapolis State Police security guards all pulled their guns on me in unison, with one yelling, "get on the ground, now!" So, I got to the ground, they put me in cuffs, and dragged me into a room for questioning.

I had to explain that I wasn't trying to murder a TSA employee, and was just a really tired 19 year old kid looking for the sentimental necklace his friend gave him.

The interrogating cop blinked for a minute, pages the TSA personnel, and asks them if they've seen the necklace. They haven't, and I'm let go with a warning to come to security first if I've lost something and not just go into the security booth.

The kicker? The damned necklace was on my fucking neck the whole time, as I found out once I sat down to wait again for my flight (again, I was exhausted). Definitely not one of my prouder moments.

Username: chrisdurand

"This is not how I'm going to fucking die. I will NOT give him this." Abusive ex. He was standing behind me and pulled a serrated kitchen knife to my throat. I snapped his wrist and hurled the knife behind a bookcase (I was aiming for opposite side of the room - happy accident), threw him forward, and left him passed out ass up.

I don't know where the strength to throw him like that came from, I guess it was adrenaline. Put all the pillows like mattresses from the princess and the pea on his bed and stole every blanket. I had no way to get home. I don't drive, he lived in the woods across the state from my house.

He isolated me there a lot, many times he had excuses for not bringing me home even though I wouldn't have enough of my medication if he didn't. He tried pulling a knife on me a few times. He was always drunk when it happened, of course.

That time when he woke up, he asked what happened. I told him exactly what he did and exactly how I reacted. His immediate response was "that's my girl" with a kiss. I didn't leave him then. I should have. I left months later on Valentine's Day.

That January he tried to pull a gun on me, I don't think it was loaded. It turns out, he had no idea what to do when I screamed "then fucking do it, you coward!" He was a coward. He said he wanted to see my reaction and put the gun down. I have a mean right hook.

He complimented it after. He never did that again. Maybe he was trying to get a reaction. He smiled and laughed when he said that like it was normal. To my knowledge, that is not normal.

It's been ten years. I still think about it now and then, my blood still boils. I'm proud of 18 year old me. I could have died. I could have died so many times and I didn't. I never let him have that. I didn't die that way. I fought back and I lived. It was terrifying and I guess that's why I didn't leave.

I loved him. I thought he was showing me he loved me in some sick way. I don't know what it really meant, why he would do it, why I would believe him, or why I excused it so easily. I don't know why I let him think that was part of love, why what we had in common made us perfect for each other despite the violence, why I let a 25 year old man almost kill me and tell me it was romantic.

I don't know how I didn't die. I really don't. I don't know why he put down that gun, if it was loaded, if he was being honest, if he would have shot had I cowered or said anything else. Maybe he didn't expect me to yell back. I remember I picked up the gun after I hit him.

I remember pointing it at his face and yelling if he ever tried it again, I wouldn't be the one who died. That it wasn't funny. That he was a monster. I remember shaking. I don't remember what happened after that. I don't remember where he put it or if he was the one who put it away in the first place.

I don't remember putting it down, but I probably did. I probably cried, I don't know. I don't think I saw it again. I don't remember why he pulled it out. I woke up in my bed the next day. I don't know if he drove me home or if I ran to a bus, but I don't think busses ran that late. I think it was late. It was dark out.

I'm sorry, this is a lot of writing. It's still rattling. It's been ten years and I still get the same feeling in my chest, I still feel like I'm going to die, I still feel the same rage bubble up behind the terror. I still feel that visceral, animalistic I Won't Die Here.

I still feel so angry that someone could do that. I still feel as scared and confused and I still don't know which of those feelings was the strongest because there were so many and they happened all at once. It's a lot. It's so much. He did a lot of scary things.

I think i need to go calm down. I'm going to pet my dragon. There are so many feelings it almost feels like there aren't any at all sometimes.

Username: daggerxdarling

My ex husband and I had a standoff moment when I came home after a night out with friends. He told me, before I left that night, that I should let him know when I got back, even if he was asleep.

So, I get back, enter our dark bedroom where he's sleeping, and gently touch his shoulder while whispering his name. His immediate instinct was to shove me backwards, grab the revolver out of the top drawer of the bedside table and point it at me.

I awkwardly laughed while telling him, "Hey, it's me. Please put that down. I was just telling you I'm home like you wanted. Don't shoot."

Afterwards, he acted like it was totally reasonable that he pulled a gun on me. I argued, but whatever. I just started panicking a little any time he reached into that drawer.

To be clear, my ex was never traumitized by anything. He grew up in solid middle class, white America. He had never experienced ANY crime. He never went to war or had any violent situation ever happen to him.

The most traumatic thing that ever happened to him was when he found a bat in his bedroom at his last apartment and had to figure out how to get it out with just a tennis racket.

Nonetheless, he was completely paranoid. He had army rations in case of "an apocalypse.". He kept a baseball bat by the shower at all times just in case someone snuck up on him in the shower. He had two machetes, one of which he kept in his car all the time, in case of "zombies".

He subscribed to a zombie apocalypse preparation site and bought a bunch of stuff for the sake of "survival". He had guns secretly stashed all over our apartment/home.

My least favorite was that he was absolutely paranoid about police to the point where, when he first met my best friend, he bellowed at her to, "Go fuck yourself and your pig friends!"

Why? Because she said, "Well, I understand why there's tension right now, but I don't think ALL cops are bad. I think there are some good and some bad like in everything else."

When he got pulled over once for speeding in our military neighborhood (he is an officer/surgeon in the Air Force), he pulled over past our house (instead of our drive way which was RIGHT THERE!) because he didn't want the cops to "see [his] wife through the window and make plans to come back later when [he] wasn't home to protect [me]."

He also didn't want them to know where we lived, even though the officer that pulled him over was going to know from his license anyway.

I pointed out that that was crazy and he said, "You don't know. It's probably happened a bunch of times but they cover it up because they're cops, Rivlet."

So, him pointing a gun at me for two minutes when I came home was the first sign of his paranoia, but it turned into something really crazy.

Username: rivlet

This was when I was a teenager. We had a friend whose apartment we would regularly hang out at (it was a spot where we could smoke weed and no one cared).

One day when we're all blitzed, a friend of the home owners pulls out a gun and starts pointing it around jokingly. He points it at one of my friends and is saying the whole time "I'm just playing" spiel.

After we all leave, my friend realizes 'holy shit, this asshole just pointed a gun at me and thought nothing of it!'. A couple of days later, we both came over to the apartment to hang out (dumbass teenagers), but he was waiting for the kid who had the gun.

Lo and behold he shows up, and they both immediately brawl in the front doorway. The mom shows up super pissed and kicks everyone out, I'm completely stunned at how fast everything escalated.

Later that week I'm there with my friend who lives there, it's just us two, smoking and talking about random things. There's a knock at the door. The kid who had the guns cousin comes in. I know him fairly well, so he joins in on the smoke session.

After about 10 minutes, there's a loud, hurried knock at the door, and the COUSIN answers the door. He flings the door open, and two masked people walk in, one with a revolver and the other with a pistol.

They both point the guns at our heads, saying give everything up. I remember feeling really numb about the whole situation, I complied and gave them my wallet, phone and smokes, but I was still processing the whole 'holy shit we're getting robbed'.

They then order us to get on the ground and we both get guns straight to the back of our heads. Me and my friend were both looking at each other, and I saw the one with the pistol cock it and jam it into the back of his head. I thought I was about to see my friend be executed.

We're both as calm as we can be, just repeating 'just take whatever you want and leave' and they ransack the living room/his bedroom, and leave.

We're both still on the floor for a couple minutes processing what just happened, and then realize his mom was in the back room, and called the cops while this was all going down.

Not even 2 minutes afterwards, a bunch of cops kick the door in and point rifles at us telling us to not move. So AGAIN, were held at gunpoint.

They question us about everything and end up finding the cousin and the two masked assailants, and wouldn't you know it, one of them was the one who played around with a pistol. Their alibis conflicted with each other and they had hard evidence that they did it.

I testified against them, they were sentenced to juvie, and I never went back to that apartment complex, and never want to run into them again.

The thing that still fucks with me is that we had no part in that fight, hell, we didn't know about the playing with the gun til after the fact. And I knew that guy for almost a year. We talked about a lot of stuff, and although he wasn't a close friend, he was someone I could conversate with.

And then suddenly he doesn't hesitate to hold a live gun to the back of my head. Fucked me up for awhile with meeting new people, but I've coped with it since.

Username: titofetyukov

It was a cold night, shortly after new years this year. My boyfriend and I were going out of town for the night to visit some friends, and our two year old daughter was nestled warmly in her car seat in the backseat.

My long time friend calls just before we leave the parking lot, asking what im doing, begging me go pick up her husband and drop him off at his uncles. I'd done it a million times before, and she was one of my long time best friends.

So I reluctantly agree. I meet up with her husband, who has always been a friend to me as well, and begin my trip to his uncles. He was on the phone with someone, said he's in a silver corolla and that he will see them soon, then hangs up.

He asks me at one point to pull over and let him out because he has to pee really bad. So he does, on the side of the road in a suburban neighborhood. Weirdo.

Anyhow, as he is peeing, a man approaches in a tan ski mask and a dark jacket. He walks up to my side, flings my door open, and shoves an impressively shiny old-school revolver in my face demanding "what I've got." I scream and swear I have nothing.

My boyfriend was in the passenger seat, and was looking forward to partying with his friends that night, had about $150 worth of high quality weed on him (I don't smoke because I get panic attacks, but when he sees these friends he likes to party so I kindly watch our daughter on these rare events), and I had $250 travel money stashed in a secret place in my car ( for instances like this).

Beside our daughter in the backseat are both our laptops and his guitar.

The guy doesn't relent. I have my hands on my ignition about to start my car, cut my wheel and run this mother fucker over, but i choose not to just in case he isnt bluffing. My boyfriend throws his bag of weed out the window at him. And that loser chases it. My friends husband is standing there "in shock" watching the whole thing.

The guy runs off with weed, and my friends husband gets in my car and we book it the fuck out of there, the whole time with this guy in my backseat freaking out, screaming like a child. Not even my two year old was acting this ridiculous. Seemed over the top.

I get to the top of the street and make my friends husband get out and walk the rest of the way. We leave the city quickly. After we were to safety we talk about it and decide we were set up.

It was too weird that about 30 seconds after my friends husband tells someone what my car looks lik and gets off the phone, we are robbed. He's not, but we are

Even weirder is nothing that was obviously of real value was taken. Even weirder is i hear nothing from my friend for about a month. Even weirder is I talk to his uncle the next morning and he suggests it was a set up without me raising that point myself.

When i did hear from her, I found out three days after we were robbed her husband got arrested for trafficking heroine and possession of weed, (and that she is done with him). And I know how broke he was at the time. Hmmm.... Well, karma was served.

Also that night before my bf tossed the bag of weed out the window, he somehow unnoticeably took a decent chunk out of the bag to keep, but I didn't know til we arrived at his friend's house and he showed it off. He never ceases to amaze me.

Username: WhatsAMaWhoosIt

Home invasion victim here. My roommate and I were dealers, but kinda shitty broke-ass dealers (weed only). There'd been a string of our friends/associates getting held up at gunpoint and robbed, mostly in cars- and we knew by whom (for them, not us, but we to this day suspect the same people at least organized it).

Anyway, one night I was getting ready for bed and was in my room, my roommate had a couple friends over, and someone knocked on the door.

My roommate looked through the peephole, saw someone smile, and I took a peek through my bedroom window onto the front porch, but since I was in my room we didn't communicate. I didn't recognize them, and neither did he, but we both assumed they were clients for the other.

He opened the door only to realize that there were three of them, hoodies up. He tried to slam the door but they had a foot in and shoved their way in. I heard noboy talking and scuffling after the door was opened so I opened my bedroom door to a gum in my face.

As soon as I opened my door they started shouting "on the ground on the ground" so we all got on the ground, they taped up our hands behind our backs, and put tape over our mouths. They started questioning us about where the money was as one of them went through our pockets taking wallets and phones.

They rifled through the desk aim the living room and the one in my room and didn't find much, a few dtwrnties, some smaller bills, and a jar with a very small amount of weed in it. At this point, I started getting questioned heavily and pistol- whipped in the back of the head.

It didn't really hurt at the time, and although I was telling them where my cash stash was, they repeatedly threatened to shoot me. They found the stash but it was so little they thought I was lying and hit me more.

They got my roommate up on the couch and punched him in the face a couple times, busted his lip and glasses, and he attested to us being broke-ass bitches.

They kicked me some more and tore my room apart, took my jar of change, my dagger, our Xbox and some games; kicked me in the ribs, and left after telling us to stay on the ground and silent. we waited for must have been fifteen minutes of total silence before we started getting up.

All through the process I was begging them not to shoot me, but I never felt like they were going to. They were young, definitely teenagers, and seemed very inefficient.

They were there for ages, like over fifteen minutes. They all had guns and one of them always had one trained on us, one did the hitting and pistol whipping, and the third the looting. I was scared, but never for my life.

I was more as raid for my friends than anything else, and felt guilty my roommate and I had let them get into that situation. Nonetheless, I called my dad and explained everything to him and cried through the night on his couch.

We moved out that week, and I'm a little ptsd'd by the whole thing, although writing about it here has been cathartic rather than stressful.

Prior to this, I'd faced what I thought was certain death a couple times in really bad car accidents, which put me somewhat at peace with myself getting shot, but I still feel really shitty about my friends being there.

Username: alexthealex

Happened twice in my life to me. The first time was when my friend went to his ex's house to get his skates and some other things after a recent break up.

She was batshit. She was Mrs. Teen _____ at the time, was in and out of troubled kids homes, and I later found out that my GF's best friend is her step sister. AAAANYYWAY.

We get to her house and she has this other guy there. He is starting stuff with John the second we get out of the car.

John talks shit back and sooner or later this guy pulls out a gun. Another friend who rode with us pulled a bat out and went after the guy with the gun, and succeeded.

I can't say I was too scared at that moment. He wasn't angry at me, I don't think that if he did shoot John, that he would stick around to get us too. He was a upperclass gangster wannabee, upside down visor and all.

The second time was by the police. A drunk angry driver waited for me and a bunch of friends to leave Denny's restaurant because he thought we were all laughing at him (we weren't). This was at about midnight. We leave in my friends small old Honda, and notice the guys Chevy truck pull out too.

All the way up the highway road he was slamming his truck into our car. Trying to PIT maneuver us, and trying to get in fron then slam his brakes.

We call the same friend from the first story (The kid who had the bat), to meet us at a McDonalds with back up as we try to keep this guy at bay long enough.

We get the call that he is there and waiting for us to get to the parking lot, so we B-line it about 3 miles to meet him. As we pull up we all hop out of the car and the truck pulls in right behind us.

We head a loud glass breaking sound and I notice my friend I called (We will call him C) had thrown a tire iron through his cab window. The guy quickly sees he is in a losing situation and hops in the truck and rolls out.

The cops come before the truck is even out of sight. The hop out of the car guns drawn maybe 3 cars and about 5 cops. We are on our knees and hands on our heads with guns pointed at us as we try to explain we are not the ones he wants.

after taking 20 mins questioning everyone, one of the cops rounds me and Jason (the driver of the Honda) into the police SUV and says another cop found someone they think is the guy. Sure enough it was the drunk guy, found parked in a baseball field.

Turns out he was visiting from Cali, and the truck was a friends. We was well beyond the legal limit. He had to pay for all damages to the Honda (Which looked like an accordion,)

New engine and body work. Not sure if he saw jail time, but his license was taken away and some stiff penalties for out of state.

Apparently the McDees called the cops and said WE had guns. so that was where the confusion was on why they came out guns drawn.

Username: EtsuRah

Several years ago after getting laid off, I found work with a friend of mine who ran an online shop. I worked in their small warehouse, packing boxes. I had been there for maybe 5-6 months at this point.

One morning, while we were in the middle of the morning batch of orders, I heard a loud ruckus coming from the rear door which lead into a hallway off of the warehouse.

We had just let an employee go a week or two prior who was prone to loud outbursts to make people laugh, so I thought he had come back by the office to grab his check or something. I walked around the corner to greet him, only it wasn't him at all.

I came around the corner to see several dudes standing in the door way, wearing bullet proof vests and all of them pointing guns toward me.

They screamed at me to get on the ground right around the time that I had registered that they were cops, but were all plain clothes with vests on.

I got on the ground and put my hands out while one guy kept asking me how many people were in the building, which I couldn't answer because he had a gun pointed at me. The other dudes walked past me into the warehouse to round up everyone else, guns at the ready.

After a minute of being absolutely terrified, face-down on the ground repeating "oh shit" to myself, the one guy told me to get up and go outside, where I was met by a uniformed officer.

He said to me "Don't run, or you'll have a very bad day," to which I replied "no problem, already is a bad day." It was around this time that these dudes realized absolutely no one in the building was a threat to anyone and started to ease up.

We were then brought into the front office, where we learned that the dudes in the vests were ICE and they were executing a search warrant on the company over something we had sold online that was a sort of legal grey area.

We sold it for it's intended purpose, whereas some might use the product in other ways that weren't intended. We were questioned separately for a while and then cut loose. The whole time we were questioned, they had a guy guard us with his rifle across his chest.

The company was shut down for a few days while they searched everything. We came back to work a few days later and got the full scoop from the owner.

We believed that they were expecting to find all sorts of illegal activities at the business and found nothing of the sort in the end.

It would have been easier for them to have just come up to the door and knocked, instead of kicking in the door and pointing guns at everyone.

I did work there for another 2 years or so, and in the end the court battle that followed the raid just sort of fizzled out. They found no wrong doing on our part, and ultimately just confiscated our inventory of the item in question and we continued on as a business.

Username: bizzle4shizzled

I lived in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania for a bit. I lived in a upscale white expat neighbourhood. The company I worked for rented this mansion with pool and staff for me to stay in while working for them on contract. Beautiful place.

I was there for a few months when my housekeeper starts asking me for money. Her baby is very ill and needs medical treatment.

Now, I didn't know what the company was paying here but I knew people around town weren't getting great pay and I have a heart so I started giving her some cash every now and then.

Wrong move. My housekeeper now knew I had money lying around the house. She then proceeds to call a few of her friends.

The next week I wake up with about 5 or 6 scary Tanzanian guys in camo pants and AK's in my face. They force me on the floor and start yelling at me in English, but I couldn't understand a word due to shock.

They tie my feet and hands together and ask me where the money is. I have no fucking clue what this guy is talking about, so I just tell him where my wallet with £200 is. Obviously he's not happy with that result and the other guys start raiding my house and loading up what I assume was a van outside.

Scared of getting raped, I told the remaining guy (guarding me in my bedroom) that I had some diamond rings (all fake. Claire's, £4,99) in my nightstand drawer as a distraction.

The guy gets the rings and looks over at my hands. I'm wearing my engagement ring. The guy demands that I give him my engagement ring. My engagement ring is stuck, I cannot take it off. I'm scared for my life that he'll cut my finger off as two of the guys had machetes.

With a lot of spit I'm able to take it off and hand it to the guy. The guy leaves the bedroom and closes the door. For about 30 minutes I hear them entering and leaving the house. I thought I was going to die since none of them had bothered wearing masks. I got myself untied and went over to the bathroom attached to the bedroom and locked the door.

They tried to get in a few times but it was a thick solid wooden door they couldn't break down. For a good 15 minutes I cried until the house became quiet.

After an hour of no movement, I slowly got out of the bathroom and in to the living room. Everything gone. Laptops, TVs, PC's, my corner sofa, my purse, my wallet and my phone.

No idea what the fuck the emergency number is in Tanzania or if they even have one, so I walk over to my neighbours (5 minutes away) and they call the police.

To my amazement, the police was quite efficient and found the guys a week later, hanging out at my housekeepers house.

All my stuff gone but the guys are in jail. A small victory in a scary situation. I quit my job after that and moved the hell out of Tanzania.

Username: Axesta

It's story time, people. I was working at a Dunkin' Donuts last winter (Just before Christmas) when this incident occured.

It was just me, a scrawny assed white teenager and my obese, most likely depressed, morose as fuck shift manager who was a genuinely decent guy, but was not too smart. Like, *really* not too smart.

So my shift manager, (whom I shall call Eeyore for the duration of this story) was in the back office doing the usual end-of-day shift manager things on the computer.

His only view of the front counter was a monitor displaying the CCTV feeds from the various cameras around the building (drive thru, front counter, back room, etc.).

I was alone working the front counter. I could see the front door from where I was behind the register/drink preparation area.

The first thing that registered with me about the man who came through the door was his ski mask. The man had on a hoodie and sweat pants, the cheap cotton kind you'd buy next to the underwear and socks in Walmart.

He was also wearing thick cotton gloves (although his gloves weren't that unusual, considering the cold winter weather).

The next thing to register was his gun. Not that he *had* a gun, but the way he was holding it. It was sideways like you'd see in the movies.

My first thought was "what the hell is this dude doing, he's never shot anyone in his life." So after that, I wasn't really scared of his gun. I figured he was just using the gun to try and demand control of the situation.

The rest of the robbery went pretty much as you'd expect- the man said 'this is a robbery' or 'gimme all your money' or whatever, he forced me to the back, made Eeyore empty the safe into a bag, and then ran out the back fire door into the night.

As I have said before: Eeyore was not a smart man. What you *should* do in a situation like that is call the police. Immediately.

What Eeyore did however, was sit there like a dumbass for a while and then call our boss (which admittedly was not a bad idea, but should've waited until *after* he knew the police had been called). I had to call the police for him.

I never knew *why* the guy robbed a Dunkin' Donuts and to a certain extent, it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things.

As it turns out, he got caught about a month later when he tried to pull the same stunt in the next town over. He escaped with no more than $1000 in cash and ended up getting 40 years for armed robbery.

Username: [deleted]

Got held up at gun point right outside my house in college. We lived right next to the ghetto and had some minor incidents, but usually we weren't bothered.

Well, the day The Dark Knight came out (not actually relevant) I was waking out my back door to go get my car from a friends house when a couple of dudes walking down the alley next to my house asked if I had a cigarette.

This was around noon and in broad daylight, with dozens of other houses within view but oddly it happened to be a ghost town with nobody else in sight. I told them I didn't and kept walking.

That's when I hear yelling and running behind me. The first thing I notice when I turn around is one of the guys is brandishing a gun and tells me to stop or he'll shoot me. I felt oddly calm, almost in shock.

Guy with the gun asked for my wallet. I was a broke college student with no cash, don't really know what they were expecting. I started to non-chalantly pull out my wallet (a little too non-chalant as the guy tells me to "hurry the fuck up").

As I wasn't nearly as nervous as I should be for some reason, I kinda chuckled and said "There is nothing in there dude, but whatever." He looked in the wallet to find exactly nothing of value and handed it back to me.

That's when his pussy 5 foot tall gunless sidekick decided to step in and tell me to "give him my motherfucking cell phone."

Again, I chuckled as at this time I was irresponsible as fuck and always drank too much and pissed the bed and ruined my cell phones, so I just kept buying $15 prepaid phones at Target that I could put my SIM card in. Handed the dude my phone and said "take it dude, it literally cost me $15."

This is when I just felt a mutual respect with the gun-wielding dude. It wasn't spoken but I could just feel the "wow you are poor as fuck too, sorry for bothering you". He didnt even bother double checking to make sure I wasnt lying about how shitty my phone was.

He just told me to go inside and I almost felt like I should shake the guy's hand but obviously didn't and went inside.

It wasn't until I called my sister to tell her she was going to have to pick me up for the movie because I wasn't in the mood to drive that I started shaking and it all sunk in.

Sad part is the cops were so useless in that area that I didn't bother calling because I knew they would care more about arresting jay-walkers on campus.

My mom's and dad's reaction was just to crack up at the fact I was so poor the robbers didn't even want anything of mine.

Username: [deleted]

I was at a house party and was hanging out with these two guys I didn't know, but seemed chill enough. Things got weird, and by some crazy misunderstanding they ended up thinking I had robbed their house earlier that week (I've never robbed anybody of anything, lol).

It got weird, and I went to leave the party. They followed me outside, and we started fighting on the front lawn. After about 30 seconds I felt something cold and saw that one of them had a kitchen knife pressed against my ribs.

I let them take me to the ground after that (didn't have much choice) and one of them squatted behind me, with me in a sort of headlock with my head in his lap, and the other one got on top of me and held the knife to my throat.

I thought they were trying to find out where I live so they could rob me (like I said, crazy weird misunderstanding) so i told them to go fuck themselves.

This was a decently nice suburban neighborhood so I wasn't thinking they were really gonna kill me, but in hindsight that probably wasn't the smartest move. I was feeling a ton of adrenaline and a bit of panic, but no real fear somehow.

Anyway, the sound of us fighting initially must have alerted the person who's party it was (good friend of mine, and a huge gun fan/gunsmith) so after about a minute or two of being on the ground with the knife on my throat, I heard the front door fly open and my buddy came around the corner, cocked a 12 gauge shotgun and put it to the guys head.

Before he even really had a chance to react, some drunk college girl (I was still in high school at the time) leaving the party walked by, saw what was happening, screamed, and with balls of absolute steel ran over to me, pushed the dude off of me and laid on top of me (motherly instincts?

I have no idea why. The dude was already at gunpoint) and didn't get off until the 2 dudes were in their car speeding out of the neighborhood.

All in all, not a bad night. 5/7 would do again. Wish I got that girls number though. Thank you fearless wasted white girl!

Edit: just remembered, I ran into headlock guy a few years later in a Starbucks. I'm MUCH bigger than this dude, and was about to start wailing on him, but he gave me the most heartfelt apology ever.

He said he was big into bad drugs at the time (big surprise) and did a lot of terrible shit. Said he's been sober well over a year and trying to make amends.

Dude was damn near crying apologizing. He really did look cleaned up and seemed genuinely better. I shook his hand and told him I forgave him.
Username: Wheres_my_guitar

I was sixteen (f) and my mom recently broke up with her boyfriend. He was into reptiles, so he gave us some lizards to take care of after my brother (14m) and mine had passed. We did not really have the time or means to take care of them so we wanted to give them back.

He arrived at our house and my mom greeted him. I was on the computer in the living room, and then she rushes in the door with my brother and says "call 911 my ex has a gun".

I guess he tried to point the gun at my mom and tell her to get into his car, but unfortunate for him my brother came home from a friends house at that exact moment and my mom convinced him to lead him to the door (they were in the garage).

Anyways, we ended up blockading my moms bedroom and then locking ourselves in the master bathroom. All the while we could hear heavy thudding. It went away for a moment, and then we heard broken glass with the sound of thudding going up the stairs. There was loud banging and the faint sound of drilling.

Finally he broke through the door of the bedroom and we could hear him heavily breathing outside the bathroom and messing with equipment. It was just my mom and I holding the door as she tried to gently blow into the phone to let the 911 operator know we are still there and in danger. He finally broke open the door.

He began ranting and pointing the gun at my mom. Shortly after the police arrived (about 10 minutes after 911 was called), and everyone was trying to talk with him and reason with him. He kept saying he just wanted to talk and how my mom made him do this.

He (thankfully) kept saying he never wanted to get the kids involved, so he ended up not really pointing the gun at me and more so my mom but mostly himself.

When he broke through our main floor window, he cut himself coming inside. To add to him constantly putting the gun to his head, he was bleeding heavily everywhere.

He even checked his long gash under his arm, and you could see muscle and pink through it. It was one of the most disturbing things I've seen. After a couple hours I started to panic more heavily. I ended up having a severe panic attack.

The police and my mom managed to convince him to let my brother and I go, but my mom had to stay. He also decided to agree to let my mom guide us out for concern for me. The police quickly grabbed us and carried us away (including my mom).

I remember having trouble walking and the officer was rather rough with me as she tugged me rather aggressively and told me to keep walking. I found some strength in my feet, and when I looked up I was equally disturbed at what I saw.

My neighbors, there had to be at least 100 people, all staring, laughing, taking videos and pictures. I felt like I was on some reality T.V. show. There were so many police cars everywhere, and I learned the SWAT was called, and there were snipers on the surrounding neighbors houses.

The ambulance checked me and my family out and gave us the OK, and we ended up just going to my best friends house which was near my house. I actually quite worried about my moms ex because I did not want him to get shot. He was good to my brother and I.

Unfortunately his obsession with my mother gave him instability. He agree'd to come out of the bathroom and was arrested another couple hours afterwards. I honestly can't remember too well, since time seemed to go by so fast.

While I feel like I was not in any true danger, my body and mind reacted poorly to the incident. My entire body had uncontrollable muscle spasms and twitching for a few weeks, and ever since when I undergo extreme stress, loud noises, or traumatic situations my body will twitch for hours to days. Our house was also a disaster.

The front door had been broken down, our window was missing, several doors got damaged along with our things from the police raiding our house. It took a very long time for our window to be fixed (and front door). We had boards on it for a month or two (it was summer).

I like to think for the most part I healed and moved on from what happened. I feel sorry for the man. He went to jail for about 10 years.

He recently got out of jail early on good behavior. So far we have not heard of him and we have moved since. My mom and I were playing around with the idea of changing our last names for a short period, though.

We had also moved in with my grandparents (but he knows where they live). He has not come around yet, so I believe he won't make the same mistake he did last time. I hope he is coming to a better place.

Username: Crypsisrosa

I've had a gun pulled on me 2-3 times in my life and I've never really had a reaction to it. I get annoyed more than anything because someone got the drop on me more than anything else. Its cost me pocket change because more than likely I wasn't armed when it happened.

I've been mugged close to 30 times over my life, I don't consider myself an easy mark nor do I think it happens to be caused by where I live because muggings aren't very common as far as I know but during the major span of time most of it happened people chalked it up to “bullying” in one form or another.

When I was a kid I used to get my ass kicked by high-school aged kids and they would take anything of value I had on me. Between Jr high and high school I was robbed about 10 times. The scariest times where when I was cornered by crackheads with knives.

The worst one was when a tweaker came at me with a dull little swiss army knife and gave me 4-5 superficial little stabs to prove it was sharp, it wasn't more serious than needing some band aids but it got the “point” across.

I figured out real quickly that when I was going to school it was much better not to carry anything worth stealing because it probably would be, at least when I got kicked off the bus which happened frequently because I got into fights (yay public school system and its policy of mutually assured suspensions!)

the first time I ever had a gun pulled on me was the year before high school, I was 14 at the time, and I was kicked off the buss for two weeks for a minor fight with an amazon of a girl. She got pissed that I called her a bitch as my single word retort to a string of insults she was throwing out and took her big ball necklace and started flogging me with it (had welts the size of dimes on my shoulders) and I was kicked off the bus on principal (of defending myself against a girl, I had to shove her off me) because I held her down until the bus driver got involved while I was punched in the back of the head by guys on the bus. Great place rite?

Well it was 6 am and I was caught on a main road outside of a seethe stretch of the valley in far East Mesa [Az] and nothing was open. I noticed a guy about a quarter mile behind me and didn't think anything of him at first. He was getting closer but there was no place to run or hide so I just kept on walking as he closed the gap. When he was about 10 yards behind me he got my attention.

At first he tried hitting me up for change but I told him I was broke and didn't stop walking, until I heard him cock his dinky little revolver and I stopped cold. He colorfuly told me to hand over everything I had and I realized I was getting robbed, again, and turned around with a glare.

After repeating myself he raised the gun from aiming at chest level to head level and I could see the twists inside the barrel and it seemed a lot bigger.

I was scared yes but it registered more on the level of giving an incorrect answer than a poor life choice. Knowing from experience from one sided fights resisting someone just after my stuff wasn't worth it so I turned my pockets out and repeated myself.

I don't remember exactly what I was thinking but it went along the lines of “This shit again?!” it was just light enough that I could see the cylinder of the revolver and it couldn't have been much bigger than a 22lr because it was like 12 shots.

I froze up with that realization because I suddenly felt stupid for being threatened with a pea shooter but I made the decision I wasn't going to do anything about it; like tweakers with knives it would still hurt at the very least. He quickly got frustrated and grabbed my back pack and yanked it from my by a shoulder strap and spun it off.

I think he expected me to run but after regaining my footing I looked at him expecting him to do an inspection and leave me and my shit in peace. After what seemed like a five minuet stare down he told me to start walking and I complied.

After I was a few steps away he took off running into the near by scrub and I never saw him again. I was more pissed than anything as I tromped into school. I got detention from 3 classes for forgetting class materials and after I told them I was held up at gun point (which they obviously didn't buy) they told me how much each book cost and I would have to replace close to $300 in text books.

I had to walk home and tell my parents who lost their shit and threatened to sue the school. From that day on if I was kicked off the bus (which I was more often found to be in the rite on) I either didn't go to school or I got rides.

Username: MuggedInTheValley

A few years ago, I had left home and was staying at a friend's. I left my girlfriend at the time's house early, missing the end of Dr. No, as I didn't want to be mugged on the way back.

So I got mugged on the way back. I was on the phone with my mother at the time, who was pissed that I left school and had to get away from her constant emotional abuse. So she's yelling me and I pass these two Latino guys on the street. I make it a habit to always check behind me when I pass folks, but my mother's screaming distracted me and by the time I noticed the noise, it was too late to run.

One of the guys pulled out a long revolver. I let out a really pissed off "God damn it" which finally quiets my mother down and makes her ask "What's the matter?"

"I'll call you back, I'm being robbed." So, the guy with the gun chuckles a little and tells me to give him everything. I kinda reach into my pocket and hand him my pocket change, as I wasn't going to let him have my wallet. He turns to his friend and asks if they should take my phone. The guy reluctantly agrees and the gunman turns back to me and tells me to give him my phone as if I couldn't hear the idiots standing right in front of me.

Without thinking, I tell him I cannot give him my phone. He levels the gun at me and asks "You can't give me your phone?"

Screaming at myself to give him my phone, I tell him again "I cannot give you my phone." In hindsight, years of child abuse likely made me more afraid of my mother than anything else.

He nods to his friend, who fumbles out a butterfly knife, and at this point, I repeated my words and decided I needed to do something. Either run away and hope he misses, or tackle him and hope I don't get stabbed. I don't know what to do.

Allow me to take a moment and try to define what I was physically feeling. The entirety of my chest felt hollow, like it could descend a thousand feet down into nothingness, a chasm of fear that felt like no fear I had ever felt. My body felt like it wasn't mine. I felt cold, but not in any way I've ever felt before. My arms were tense, aching, but it wasn't mine. Not sure how else to describe it. It was a very detached moment.

I'd been nearly murdered by bullies when I was younger, and I swore to myself I'd never just let anyone... do that again. I don't know what I was hoping to accomplish. Nobody was there, so I wasn't going to get any badass cred, and I was well aware that I was basically begging to get shot by Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee. I noted that none of the cars passing by that could very easily see what was going on were even slowing down. It was doubly surprising, as this street was on of the safest in the city and was well known for being one of the streets the cops didn't like any crime on.

But there I was, confused, and so scared I wasn't scared at all, and telling myself to do SOMETHING. One, two, three, let's go-

"Okay get out of here." And they left. So I called the police. They were there in about five minutes. Called my mom back, who was sobbing and didn't quite understand what had happened. Continued to my friend's house. And told a helluva story to a party he had going on. Played it up for the crowd, had a good laugh.

And then later I cried myself to sleep. For the next year I would often get nervous, scared, just randomly thinking back to that incident. One of my "friends" had the gall to say that the gun probably wasn't even loaded and I shouldn't talk about it like it was a real scary incident. The one of our mutual friends was robbed in the same area by the same guys and got shot at after he refused to give them anything. Guess they were pissed about that.

They were brought in. Taken to court. I was living a state away at that point, and the DA's office wanted me to testify. They'd ended up robbing fifteen people and I was the only one to get a good look at them since the dumbasses decided to rob me under a streetlight. They weren't from the area it turned out, which is why they thought that robbing people in that area would be a good idea.

Didn't have to. They plead out for 25 years. And... well the funny thing is, even though I wasn't there to see it, I felt better. Like, I felt relief, for the first time in a year I was able to sleep decently.

Nowadays, it's not a big deal. Something that happened once, managed to put it behind me after a while. Eventually saw the end of Dr. No. It was okay.

Username: AmphibiousTitan

I was working as a pest control tech, treating what were supposed to be empty apartments in a medium-sized apartment complex in a high-crime city.

When I treated occupied units, the residents were always notified beforehand and I always knocked three times before entering (yes, just like Sheldon.

But this is before TBBT ever came out) but when I treated vacant units, I just let myself in. Well, I did until I got a Glock pointed in my face by a frightened police officer, who had been on his way out the door to go to work when I barged in.

So my brain, genius that it is, grabbed at the first English phrase that it could think to say to convince an armed and frightened member of law enforcement that I was not a threat and pretty please don't shoot me in the face?

"Pest control." He looked me up and down, and I have never been so thankful to wear a long sleeved white uniform shirt, khaki slacks and work boots during the Texas summer as I was at that moment. If it was casual Friday, I might have been screwed. As it was, he went from frightened to apologetic and holstered his weapon.

"Sorry, I didn't hear you knock." My genius brain, with its command of the English language and average interpersonal skills found the perfect reply to this sudden change of fortune.

"Spray?" I croaked. He nodded. So, now that I had survived my brush with Death in the form of a uniformed police officer whom I started to vaguely recognize, I started to muse about what had just transpired and if he would be the arresting officer when I took my revenge on the office lady who put his apartment on the vacant list...

"Hey, don't I know you?" Please, don't recognize me... this is not happening... "Yeah, you're Soothsayer6580, right?"

Yes, yes I am. C'mon genius brain, one more time... "Uhhh...."

This is now an Incident. There will be an Incident Report. If I am particularly unlucky, there will be an Arrest Report. I am feeling particularly unlucky...

"How is your Dad?" There is no correct way for me to answer this question when it is posed by a member of law enforcement for a variety of reasons that I will not get into on Reddit, so my genius brain decided that English is a foreign language. I shrugged.

"You're not going to tell him about this, are you?" I believe in Luck. Good and bad, it exists. I've experienced both too many times to deny its existence and it is far too fickle of a thing to be attributable to a loving God, unless He has a twisted sense of humor or an extremely convoluted Plan.

I play the lottery, I buy raffle tickets, I hit the casino every once in a blue moon. But I never, ever try to push my luck with people or in situations where I could be utterly destroyed. At least, not intentionally.

I finished my job and headed for the door. Had I remembered the English language yet? Nope. Well how else could I tell Officer Terminator of the Exterminator thank you for not shooting me in the face and I am very, very sorry for frightening you?

Maybe I should just wave as I leave? Or a thumbs up? Or a Boy Scout salute?

Username: Soothsayer6580

This was when I was a teenager. We had a friend whose apartment we would regularly hang out at (it was a spot where we could smoke weed and no one cared).

One day when we're all blitzed, a friend of the home owners pulls out a gun and starts pointing it around jokingly. He points it at one of my friends and is saying the whole time "I'm just playing" spiel.

After we all leave, my friend realizes 'holy shit, this asshole just pointed a gun at me and thought nothing of it!'. A couple of days later, we both came over to the apartment to hang out (dumbass teenagers), but he was waiting for the kid who had the gun.

Lo and behold he shows up, and they both immediately brawl in the front doorway. The mom shows up super pissed and kicks everyone out, I'm completely stunned at how fast everything escalated.

Later that week I'm there with my friend who lives there, it's just us two, smoking and talking about random things. There's a knock at the door.

The kid who had the guns cousin comes in. I know him fairly well, so he joins in on the smoke session. After about 10 minutes, there's a loud, hurried knock at the door, and the COUSIN answers the door. He flings the door open, and two masked people walk in, one with a revolver and the other with a pistol.

They both point the guns at our heads, saying give everything up. I remember feeling really numb about the whole situation, I complied and gave them my wallet, phone and smokes, but I was still processing the whole 'holy shit we're getting robbed'.

They then order us to get on the ground and we both get guns straight to the back of our heads. Me and my friend were both looking at each other, and I saw the one with the pistol cock it and jam it into the back of his head. I thought I was about to see my friend be executed.

We're both as calm as we can be, just repeating 'just take whatever you want and leave' and they ransack the living room/his bedroom, and leave.

We're both still on the floor for a couple minutes processing what just happened, and then realize his mom was in the back room, and called the cops while this was all going down. Not even 2 minutes afterwards, a bunch of cops kick the door in and point rifles at us telling us to not move. So AGAIN, were held at gunpoint.

They question us about everything and end up finding the cousin and the two masked assailants, and wouldn't you know it, one of them was the one who played around with a pistol. Their alibis conflicted with each other and they had hard evidence that they did it.

I testified against them, they were sentenced to juvie, and I never went back to that apartment complex, and never want to run into them again.

The thing that still fucks with me is that we had no part in that fight, hell, we didn't know about the playing with the gun til after the fact. And I knew that guy for almost a year. We talked about a lot of stuff, and although he wasn't a close friend, he was someone I could conversate with.

And then suddenly he doesn't hesitate to hold a live gun to the back of my head. Fucked me up for awhile with meeting new people, but I've coped with it since.

Username: titofetyukov

It was about 1:30 in the morning, I had been asleep for a couple hours after drinking a good several beers.

I am woken up but loud stomping around upstairs (this is a house and the room I rent is in the basement). I do not think too much of it beyond the fact it is pretty annoying as my the people I live with can be pretty loud at times.

The stomping starts coming down the stairs and I think my roomie is pissed and is coming down to bitch about something, then my room door is kicked open.

I sit bolt upright in my bed saying "What the fuck" and wham I get smoked on the top side of my head, knocking me out of my bed and on to the floor, I may have been knocked out at that time but am not really sure.

I pull myself up to my feet and turn around to see some dude all in black with his face covered pointing a shotgun at me. What runs through my mind at the point is aww fuck this is not seriously a home invasion. He starts yelling for me to get moving to go up stairs.

This is when I feel a warm wash running down my face, Blood, and a lot of it. I am a bit staggered on my feet, both from my earlier consumption of alcohol and from getting hit.

Getting up the stairs he is asking where the money is, my female roomie has been sat down on an upper flight of stairs with a second robber up in the master bedroom rummaging around looking for stuff, my second roomie is no where to be seen. I should note that the house is a split level, giving 4 floors for a 2 story building.

The robber who is with me is yelling at me about the drugs and the money, they have the wrong place thinking we are drug dealers, we do smoke pot but by no means have any large amounts of cash or pot around.

Now my memory is very fuzzy with everything going on, and some other bad shit has happened that I will not mention, but my missing roomie had gotten outside when the second guy came down stairs to grab me, with his partner up in the master bed looking for shit, allowing him to get outside.

My roomie was able to smash a window on the getaway car, but never got the plate number, your brain will not be working right in a situation like this. He also managed to finally get a neighbor awake and a 911 call made, I will also note all he was wearing was a t-shirt, thats it during winter in Canada, and had grabbed an axe on his way out the door.

As soon as the sirens were audible the robbers yelled "cops, cops!" and were off and running. They got some things, probably about 2000 worth of electronics and cash (rent money ffs) and were probably pissed as I am sure they were looking for a much larger score.

Looking at the carnage afterward I had left a very solid trail of blood from my room in the basement up to the main floor, Half my body was covered in it, head wounds will bleed a lot.

News reporters were across the street almost as fast as the cops, an article made the paper the next day.
I am sorry about the wall of text, it is late here and easier to type out like this trying to remember the events.

Username: Thanatomania