These posts are based on our Good Guy with a Gun calendar. Today’s post is somewhat updated from the calendar version.
Leon Goodman was convicted of burglary of a building in 1999 and got four years’ probation. He lost it the next year and did a year in prison instead.
The convictions after that were drug cases: manufacturing or delivery of a controlled substance in 2010, which got him ten months in state jail, then possession in 2014 and possession again in 2023, with two years in prison each time.
That’s the man who was inside Impact Ministries, a church in Beaumont, a little before 10:20 on a Tuesday morning. Not that the deacon who showed up knew any of it.
He’d come in to do some cleaning in the office. Through the glass doors, he could see one of the church’s speakers sitting in the entryway, and he knew something wasn’t right.
So he drew his gun and went in. The first thing he did was flip a breaker, which turned on every light in the building — and there was a man, walking toward him.
Our Good Guy with a Gun told him to lie on the floor, then called 911. He held the man at gunpoint until officers arrived.
12News cameras were rolling when they did, and caught the man coming out through the church doors under arrest.
He was Goodman, 45, of Beaumont. According to the deacon, he’d lined up a speaker, a spotlight he’d taken down from a wall, a fan, and other electronic equipment, all ready to carry out. The deacon also said the officers told him they already knew Goodman. That’s not hard to believe.
Police took Goodman into custody. I can’t find what he was charged with this time.
Sources
News
12News ran a web story and a broadcast segment.
Church burglar suspect held up by deacon at gunpoint inside Beaumont church Tuesday has been identified (Web story)
Broadcast video (YouTube, not embedding for some reason)
2A / Specialist Media
Gun Carrying Church Deacon Foils Burglary in Beaumont, Texas ~ VIDEO (AmmoLand)