A man in Wisconsin was brutally attacked and cut numerous times after interrupting a man who was vandalizing his inflatable Minnesota Vikings yard decoration. Note, the guy lives in Wisconsin and was rocking a giant blow-up Viking on his lawn. If you know anything about Minnesota-Wisconsin rivalry you know that means the guy was deep in enemy territory. We absolutely don’t condone the actions of the vandal, however. Football rivalries should stay on the field.
Anyway, here’s what happened. 36-year-old Dave Moschel, who decorated his hard with the inflatable Viking, heard a commotion in his yard and exited his home about 7 pm on a recent Sunday to find a 21-year-old man cutting the inflatable Vike with a box cutter. Moschel guesses that the guy and his buddies thought it would be funny to cut up the decoration. Moschel confronts the guy with a, “Hey, what are you doing?” type thing and the other guys starts cutting Moschel with the box cutter blade.
Moschel was hurt pretty badly. The photos show him with cuts all over his head and face. The 21-year-old was arrested for reckless endangerment and criminal damage to property. What was most interesting to us was Moschel’s comments about having a concealed carry permit but not having his gun on him at the time of this confrontation.
Here’s what the news report says:
Moschel said he’s lucky to be alive and so is the man who stabbed him.
“Luckily, I didn’t have my concealed carry on me at the time,” Moschel said. “Ninety-nine percent of the time I leave the house, I never leave without it. And this is the one time I did. I’m kind of glad I did, because he would have been dead, and I would have had to live with that.”
If Moschel did have his gun on him, what would have happened? Yes, he probably would have shot the guy. Whether the guy would have been hit and wounded or killed remains impossible to know, but one thing is for sure, Moschel would be in a very different position now. Instead of taking photos with the media of his patched up Vike, he’d be in the police station answering questions about a shooting on his lawn. Who knows, maybe the gun would have even been used against him and Moschel would be the one dead or wounded.
Real life examples like this are why we tell you to train, train, train. Not just train on how to fire your weapon, but train in conflict de-escalation. Do you really want to have to tell someone that you killed a man over damage to a blow-up lawn decoration?
It also brings up psychological questions. Why didn’t Moschel take his gun out to the lawn before confronting this guy? He probably thought it wasn’t that big of a deal. He probably thought that getting into a possible fist fight was better than someone possibly being killed. So, there are times when it just doesn’t make sense to pull out your gun. There are times when it’s better to not use it. Having a permit shouldn’t make you reckless or eager to pull out your gun when you really don’t need to. Another thing to think about: Moschel was a father of 6 children. He has more of a responsibility to be around for his kids than to anything else, don’t you think?
In this case everything ended fairly well for Moschel, who is healing from his wounds. And, everything ended well for the Viking too, which will be patched with Viking duct tape and proudly blown up in the Moschel yard.
