Here’s a description from the local fish-wrapper about a road rage incident that occurred this morning in the Tampa Bay area:
A man fired his gun at another motorist who threatened him with a baseball bat during a road rage incident Wednesday morning in Temple Terrace, police said.
Investigators do not believe anyone was injured.
The incident occurred about 8 a.m. at the entrance to Terrace Walk Plaza, at North 53rd Street and East Fowler Avenue, Temple Terrance police said. Officers responded to a report of shots being fired.
According to police, Adrian C. Fedrick, Jr., 23, of Wesley Chapel, said he was making a wide turn after exiting the parking lot, and two men in a red pickup truck pulled into the lot as he was leaving.
“The men apparently were angry about Fedrick’s driving, and a verbal altercation ensued,” city spokesman Michael Dunn said in a news release.
The driver of the pickup parked, then exited the vehicle with a baseball bat and began chasing Fedrick’s car down 53rd Street, police said.
Fedrick told police he believed the man was going to strike the back of his vehicle with the bat so he stopped in front of KinderCare, 11501 N. 53rd St., about a block south of Fowler.
Okay, wait — he was driving down the road and being chased by an angry man with a baseball bat who was on foot. And he stopped because he thought the guy was going to whack his car? Wouldn’t that be a good reason to, you know, speed up and drive away? Here’s what he claims happened next:
Fedrick told police he got out of his car but tripped and fell, and the man then charged at him with the bat. Fearing he was about to be struck by the bat, Fedrick said, he pulled a handgun from his waistband and fired three shots toward the man with the bat, who fled on foot.
Note in the first excerpt where Fedrick stopped — in front of KinderCare, a busy daycare center — at 8 AM, prime drop-off time. So this jackass who is too dumb to simply drive away from a baseball bat-wielding pursuer who is on foot and is unable to get out of his own car without falling on his ass then decides to fire his gun in panic in front of a fucking daycare center?
Fedrick is licensed to carry a concealed firearm in Florida.
Well, sweet Jesus, of course he is.
Police said they are looking for a white male, about 20 to 30 years old, who was wearing a black shirt and possibly khaki shorts. Police did not know the make and model of the pickup.
So the cops are looking for the idiot with the bat? They should throw the asshole with the gun in the klink too for being an uncoordinated moron who discharged a gun in the vicinity of small children, but of course that’s a protected class here. Unbelievable.
Schlemizel
going OT right from the get go (sorry Betty, my experience in Fl makes me wonder why this didn’t lead to a multi-shooter gun fight at the I’m really not OK corral)
Just saw last nights Daily SHow and I want to gay marry Aneesh Chopra and have his children. I love that guy!
scav
Rise Oceans, Rise!
karen
And if a kid was shot and killed (like a girl was shot in a DC playground this week) would they even consider it to be murder or would it be collateral damage?
Eric U.
@karen: dead kids in this case would be an accident, could happen to anyone. And I wish I was kidding.
I think the road rage incident in Michigan where both parties could actually shoot was a much better outcome. They both died. But unfortunately, the lesson wasn’t learned by anyone. Except I am more careful not to piss anyone off on the road
Calouste
@karen:
That would be considered an “accident” of course. The NRA would provide him with some high-powered lawyers to protect the right of every moron to fire wildly in front of a day care center. Heck, they have protected the right of a moron to fire wildly inside a primary school.
Anoniminous
Sooner or later, somebody is going to stand their ground against somebody standing their ground and then some other number of nutenheimers are going to stand their ground and the final body count will be awesome to behold.
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
So looking up from the ground, Mr Responsible Gun Owner remembers the other guy’s shirt but is hazy on the shorts? Maybe he’s far sighted.
Schlemizel
@karen:
Given he was standing his ground it would have been simply a tragic accident nobody could have predicted. *SIGH* why won’t that damned meteor get here?
Calouste
@Anoniminous:
They might not believe in natural selection, but natural selection believes in them.
Just Some Fuckhead
An armed society is a polite society, as they say.
beltane
@Anoniminous: Awesome to behold doesn’t mean I want to behold it. This is why I am not too keen on visiting Florida for any reason.
Culture of Truth
stand your ground, motherfu**er!
scuffletuffle
OT except in the badass dept., check out the documentary on Ginger Baker on Netflix. He is/was the real deal! The end had me in tears…of laughter.
scav
Any dead children would only be judged acceptable collateral damage for the short period in which they were deemed to have actually existed at all.
Davis X. Machina
Nothing on our invasion of Chad?
Dog-wagging distraction from Benghazi!!1!?
Or more US petro-imperialism?
I need to know fast… I could work out the correct line on this myself, but I’m plowed under writing finals…
Culture of Truth
That narrows it down.
Anoniminous
@Calouste:
The entire state of Florida should be given a Darwin Award.
@beltane:
You couldn’t get me to Florida for a pile of gold, a pile of hookers, and a pile of blow.
raven
@Anoniminous: But a big ass redfish. . .sold!
jl
@Just Some Fuckhead:
” An armed society is a polite society, as they say. ”
Damn straight, and than you very much. Glad someone made that point. And Florida is armed, therefore Florida is polite. That is logic, straight up, folks.
The rest of us have been degraded into servile barbarism for so long by lack of guns, we have forgotten what polite looks like. We should be grateful for our coming education.
Schlemizel
@Culture of Truth: since they didn’t mention it he obviously was white. Iffin’ he was a colored boy they would have let us know.
Hill Dweller
@Davis X. Machina: The VA stuff is the Benghazi distraction. Sending troops to Chad is a distraction from the VA stuff.
jl
Also possible BC not sharing her banana daqs pissed people off into general crankiness. What that polite? I think not.
Davis X. Machina
@Hill Dweller: OK. I didn’t get on the ball back in September when we invaded Jordan, and my credibility suffered no end…
satby
@Anoniminous: Unfortunately my elderly mother lives near St. Petersburg, and no longer can travel herself. So I have to go to Florida, but I get out as soon as decently possible. 5 days is my absolute limit.
OzarkHillbilly
Proof that Darwin was wrong.
PurpleGirl
We have two, maybe three, candidates for Darwin Awards. The guy with the baseball bat, the guy with the gun, and the second guy in the truck (for being friends with the baseball bat guy). Here’s hoping all three haven’t begun having kids yet so that we can indeed eliminate their DNA from the gene pool. Maroons all.
Bobby Thomson
How’s about you can have any gun you want, but if your gun kills a child you do time. I’m sure our gun fellating citizens wouldn’t allow such a regime, but it sure would short circuit a lot of their arguments.
The Pale Scot
That’s why you never get out of the boat.
And it’s all going to get crazier as the generation of 60 yr olds who got CWPs when they relaxed the requirements evolve into fearful 80 yr olds with macular degeneration, hearing loss and dementia that have been on a strict diet of fox news for 20 yrs.
Anoniminous
@raven:
Nope.
@satby:
My sympathies.
raven
@Anoniminous: It was a statement not a question!
SatanicPanic
@jl: You should suggest that as a motto to the Florida Board of Tourism- “Florida Polite”.
SiubhanDuinne
That took place less than three blocks from where I used to live!
I love Betty Cracker and I greatly admire Mustang Bobby and all other Juicers who live in Florida, but Jesus, I hate that state! I’ve said it before: perforate along the GA-FL line, tear Florida off at the dotted line and set it out to sea.
Just Some Fuckhead
@SiubhanDuinne: It’s been done before.
karen
@Bobby Thomson:
How about a law where it’s “do onto yourself as you’e done to others?” or Karma on steroids. If you kill a child, your child gets killed. If you kill a man, you get killed. If you kill a mother, your mother and/or wife get killed.
beltane
@karen: They’d be cool with that. They’d be cool with anything except taking their gunz away.
Just Some Fuckhead
@karen: If you get stoned, they get you stoned?
Roger Moore
And I thought this was going to be about the gun firing road rage incident Southern Beale talked about in today’s Tennessee Gun Report. I guess there are too many to keep up with.
MattR
@Anoniminous:
Patton Oswalt has similar thoughts
jl
@SatanicPanic:
Florida Polite, or Else!
BTW, I love Flordia. Problem is the outlook and behavior of some of the inmates, er… I mean inhabitants. But I love Florida the place, especially the waterful natures found therein.
Judge Crater
For the “Why America Failed” time capsule.
jl
@Roger Moore: Quite a collection of drunks, methed out rage freaks, cop impersonators and cat shooters there. Very nice report (/snark).
burnspbesq
I suggest a new state song for Florida: “We Gotta Get Out of This Place.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxNEiZhpinY
gbear
@Anoniminous: Florida: Come for the hospitality, stay for the autopsy.
Roger Moore
@gbear:
Is Florida hospitable? I don’t think of shooting as a key sign of hospitality, but I also don’t think threatening to kill people if they say something you don’t like is polite.
Vince
@Schlemizel: Umm
Hawes
Man with a baseball bat, chasing your car. Clearly you slow down so he gets close, then peel off. Then let him get close again. Peel off.
That’s about fifteen minutes of fun right there.
Schlemizel
@Vince: not in the version BC quoted
gbear
@Roger Moore: I was trying to be ironic with the word ‘hospital’. We can change it to ‘beaches’ instead.
In libertarian Florida, you don’t go to beaches. Beaches come to you.
I’ll be here all night…
beltane
@Roger Moore: I’ve never thought of Florida as being a hotbed of civility, but then again I’m not a wingnut. Maybe it’s a RealAmerican thing to equate living in mortal fear of making eye contact with other human beings with politeness.
AnotherBruce
That story makes everybody more stupider. Can I say “more stupider” without sounding stupid?
jl
@Hawes:
” Man with a baseball bat, chasing your car. Clearly you slow down so he gets close, then peel off. Then let him get close again. Peel off.
That’s about fifteen minutes of fun right there. ”
Thanks for the road rage pro-tip. Not sure how many people are such dedicated ‘not-think-things-through-ists’ as to chase a car down a road on foot, though.
trollhattan
“Florida man.” More than just a meme.
waspuppet
Yes. Which means his story is BS, and in fact he was looking for an excuse to get out of the car and shoot a guy.
PIGL
@Anoniminous: you sure about that? How big a pile? ‘Cause in Florida, I am fairly sure the piles come as big as it takes.
Jack the Second
So what are gang initiations like in Florida now that anyone can just shoot someone to prove how tough they are?
JustRuss
@SatanicPanic: I’m thinking Florida: Polite, or Else
TerryC
@waspuppet: I ran out of my house and into my dirt road with a baseball bat-sized stick to stop a Jeep full of teenagers who had thrown a liquid on my biking-home wife a mile down the road (cell phones). They drove through a a 6′ fence and across a 500′ corn field to get around me. No, I do not wish I had had a fake metal penis instead.
Punchy
Honest question: could the Bat Man, having seen the driver’s glock, then “feared for his safety” and pulled out his own gun and shot the driver? IOW, can the aggressor legally stand his ground and shoot to kill? Wasn’t that the crux of the Zimmerman defense?
billB
here in Oreeegon, if you chase a car with a bat, they throw it in Reverse and back up over your dumb azz….
No need to waste bullets on stupid.
Mnemosyne
@Punchy:
Yes, in Florida it doesn’t matter who started the fight. As long as the survivor argues that s/he felt his/her life was in danger at any point, it’s a justified killing.
Technically, California has a “stand your ground” type of law, but ours is over 100 years old and it specifically excludes the aggressor from claiming self-defense.
boatboy_srq
@Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937: That comes from a wingnut aversion to possibly glancing at somebody else’s junk. Cuz that’d be Teh Ghey.
@SatanicPanic: @JustRuss: There was a rumour that the state tried to use “The Rules Are Different Here.” Truer than they knew.
All in all, just another typical day on Tampa Bay streets. There’s a reason COPS gets so much footage from that area.
Paul in KY
@scuffletuffle: He’s a complete nut.
Paul in KY
@Punchy: I would say he could have.
fidelio
IJWTS I think I am in love with the word “ammosexuals”. I certainly want to take it out for the evening and have some fun with it.
Southern Beale
@Eric U.:
Armed society/polite society. See? They told you so!
Meanwhile, in Memphis yesterday a CCW holder ignored a “no guns” sign at the local multiplex and took his handgun to a showing of Godzilla. It fell out of his pocket and fired.