Good Guy with a Gun #57: Philadelphia, PA
Original incident: December 26, 2023. Two men picked the wrong man to carjack at 5 AM.
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In late December 2023, around 5 AM, a 38-year-old man was in the parking lot of an old theater in Philadelphia.
It’s apparently not a bad neighborhood, about a block away from the waterfront, though it’s adjacent to some sketchy areas. There are businesses in the area, though the theater — the old United Artists Theater on South Front Street — had shut down during COVID and has yet to be re-opened.
One woman told 6ABC, “Usually, it’s kind of quiet. I run on the trail along the water and there’s a lot of homeless people but they never really bother me or anything like that.”
Another neighbor told 6ABC that “she generally felt safe in the neighborhood” but was concerned about some of the activity under the I-95 overpass, which is right around the corner.
On this morning, two young men, probably around 20 years old, approached the man in the parking lot. They wanted his car, and he didn’t want to give it to them. He drew a weapon and shot one of the men, who can be seen on surveillance video running from the parking lot and collapsing.
We don’t know much more than that, but some things are clear:
The police said that the incident looked like a self-defense shooting.
We can surmise that the man had a legal weapon, because (a) he remained at the scene, (b) police released him after a brief detainment, and (c) there were no follow-up reports relating to his actions as being criminal.
Being armed prevented yet another carjacking in the City of Brotherly Love.
Sources
There are only two sources for this story that I can find.
6ABC did a very good job of getting the story and humanizing the incident with reactions from neighbors, even giving it a full 2:45 on-air segment.
Fox 29 gave a brief summary.
That thing that never happens, happens every day.
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