On Happenstance
Apr. 29th, 2010 10:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumA man was murdered three doors down from here last night. I can't say as it's bothering me all that much; which is perhaps a bit strange. The police don't have any (public) reasons for it. I heard it happen. I passed by the location of the shooting about half an hour before it happened.
I was in the garage when it happened, three pops; the sort which don't sound like gunfire. The sort which don't really sound like gunfire even if one knows what gunfire sounds like. The rhythm was right, a short of syncopated triplet. No echo. It was a small caliber, either a .25 ACP, or perhaps a .380 (since it was pointed away, some of the echo might have been lost.
It was followed by some fast moving tires, and a car leaving the area.
Les asked what it was, and I said it sounded like small caliber gunfire.
So I killed the lights, and stepped onto the porch, where I saw someone moving to cover, and answering a question about seeing people. So I came in, told Les she needed to leave the garage, and went to look out the kitchen window until I saw people moving in the open.
Then the cops showed up, and I heard the ambulance arrive. I was, actually, pretty sure there was a fatality, because I didn't hear them leave. The news report said he died at Stanford, but the way things were being handled, I'd say he was dead on the scene. Three to the chest is what was reported.
Oddly, or perhaps not, it wasn't until someone else pointed out that I'd ridden right past the location that I thought about that aspect of it. It didn't happen when I was there, so it doesn't really matter to me. My only real concern is knowing why it happened. Not so much a prurient curiosity, as wondering if there is likely to be a vendetta going on in the neighborhood.
Today there is a shrine at the end of the block. There are at least a dozen candles, and a black board, with inscriptions like a headstone. He was just shy of 21, which seems to be pretty typical of the sorts of killing which happen in the area. Random? A personal beef? A case of mistaken identity? I don't know.
I'll probably be a bit more wary of occupied cars on the side of the road, for at least a while; esp. after dark, but there's not really a lot I can do.
Shit happens.
I was in the garage when it happened, three pops; the sort which don't sound like gunfire. The sort which don't really sound like gunfire even if one knows what gunfire sounds like. The rhythm was right, a short of syncopated triplet. No echo. It was a small caliber, either a .25 ACP, or perhaps a .380 (since it was pointed away, some of the echo might have been lost.
It was followed by some fast moving tires, and a car leaving the area.
Les asked what it was, and I said it sounded like small caliber gunfire.
So I killed the lights, and stepped onto the porch, where I saw someone moving to cover, and answering a question about seeing people. So I came in, told Les she needed to leave the garage, and went to look out the kitchen window until I saw people moving in the open.
Then the cops showed up, and I heard the ambulance arrive. I was, actually, pretty sure there was a fatality, because I didn't hear them leave. The news report said he died at Stanford, but the way things were being handled, I'd say he was dead on the scene. Three to the chest is what was reported.
Oddly, or perhaps not, it wasn't until someone else pointed out that I'd ridden right past the location that I thought about that aspect of it. It didn't happen when I was there, so it doesn't really matter to me. My only real concern is knowing why it happened. Not so much a prurient curiosity, as wondering if there is likely to be a vendetta going on in the neighborhood.
Today there is a shrine at the end of the block. There are at least a dozen candles, and a black board, with inscriptions like a headstone. He was just shy of 21, which seems to be pretty typical of the sorts of killing which happen in the area. Random? A personal beef? A case of mistaken identity? I don't know.
I'll probably be a bit more wary of occupied cars on the side of the road, for at least a while; esp. after dark, but there's not really a lot I can do.
Shit happens.
