Kenny Guffey was on the telephone with his 84-year-old mother, Christine Guffey, around 6:30 p.m. when he heard another voice in the background. Christine had reportedly walked in on a stranger inside her home. Guffey says he listened as his mother asked the stranger why he had a knife and asked that he not hurt her. Guffey, who was driving home from work, hurried to get to his mother’s home as he listened to her struggle with the intruder. The stranger threatened her with the knife and tried to pry the telephone away from her. Guffey arrived at the home in just a few minutes and drew his licensed firearm. The intruder struck Kenny with a shovel, but he was able to recover from the blow in time to hold the suspect at gunpoint until police arrived. Guffey said, “Had I not been a licensed gun carrier, he probably would have killed her. He had a knife and a shovel and he wasn’t there for afternoon tea.” (Knoxville News Sentinel, Seymour, TN, 3/6/14)
Mat-Su Alaska State Troopers stated that an apparent attempt to burglarize a Wasilla home was thwarted. The homeowner called dispatchers to report that someone had forced open her kitchen door and entered her home about 3:06 a.m. Troopers found in a preliminary investigation that someone had pulled into the woman’s driveway and first tried to steal her four-wheeler by trying to hot-wire it. During the unsuccessful burglary in progress, the homeowner fired a single shot and the suspect or suspects fled. (The Frontiersman, Palmer, AK, 7/1/14)
From The Armed Citizen® Archives
February 1960: As Roman Kosinski, a Chicago jeweler whose avocation is target shooting, waited on customers he heard window glass crash and saw a masked man grab a tray of diamond rings. Kosinski snatched a .45 cal. pistol from a drawer and fired. The thief fell to the ground and his two companions hustled him to a getaway car. Police soon found the car and arrested a suspect with a bullet wound, the slug later established by police to have been fired from Kosinski’s pistol. (Chicago Sun-Times, Chicago, IL, February 1960)
