(This happened two years ago)

Mongo The Wonder Tongan and I.

It was a bright and shiny Sunday morning in Salt Lake City.  I decided to take the family Van we affectionately call the “Jawa Sandcrawler” out to get washed.  The area of Salt Lake I lived in is called “Sugar House”.  It’s a nice quiet suburb of SLC that enjoys peaceful Sundays.  Most businesses are closed.  The Super Wash was open and I set about to getting the Sandcrawler squared away. 

You know, one doesn’t decide to go out and get mugged that day.  I had other things on my mind.  I also had a very loud automobile vac roaring while I cleaned out gummy bears and cookie crumbs from the back seats.  I was leaning inside the van from the open side door… Sunday morning in Utah, quiet area, needless to say my guard was down.  Not only down… it was just off  like the USS Stark.  The sudden realization that I was wrong hit me the same time I felt my wallet being plucked from my back pocket.  I spun around suddenly and fully ready to pounce on whoever dared snatch my billfold.

What I saw stopped me cold in my tracks.  Now, I am not a small guy.  I’m 6 foot and over 200 pounds.  I’ve done a lot of time training at Ft Benning.  I graduated my police academy only 6 points from the top of the class… I can take care of myself.  I’m not afraid of anyone.

Uh, hold onto that thought for just a sec.  I turned around and I was eye level with this fellows chin.  I look up into the eyes of this HUGE Tongan fellow.  He is almost a head taller than me and is more than twice as broad across the shoulders as I am.  Massive. Call National Geographic, I just found a Pacific Island Sasquatch.  And he has my wallet.

He very casually states that I am going to let him borrow some money.  Then he opens my wallet.

Inside my wallet I have my CCW permit right up front so it’s the first thing you see.  It was the first thing he saw too.  There is a moment of clarity between us… I know that he knows that I have a weapon on me.  And he knows that I know that he knows it.  He looks up at me and I can tell that it’s about Go Time.  He wants my weapon.  I can see the set of his eye start to change, and I could see him tensing up to pounce. I am about 1 second away from getting my lunch eaten.  Time to act fast or I would receive a severe pounding at the hands of this human siege engine.  I couldn’t run.  My back was to my van and escape to the sides was out of the question because I was well within arms reach.  We are only two feet apart, I needed some distance. 

I didn’t even think about what I am about to do because had I thought about it, I probably wouldn’t have done it.  I delivered a very swift kick to his groin as hard as I could.  It connects as solid as if I was going for a field goal.  Then with one movement I step back with my right foot as I execute a Punch Draw maneuver as hard as I could. The same time I feel my left hand connect with his upper torso, my right hand grabs the grip of my suddenly very tiny little mouse gun of a Walther PPK.  It was in an IWB rig that I had tucked my shirt over.  I don’t remember uncovering it, but the draw was none the less unimpeded. Mongo (that’s what he has been referred to ever since this happened) must have been caught by surprise.  Because he falls backwards.  On the way down his head smacks into the concrete vac foundation.  He is more than a little stunned, and more than a lot angry.  He would have killed me right then and there had I not been armed.  I was holding my PPK firmly in my grasp and had it leveled squarely on the center mass of his head.  This is where Mongo has a change of attitude.  I don’t know if he was starting to get shocky from the blow to his head, because it couldn’t have been because he was starring down the barrel of my ever shrinking little PPK.  It felt smaller and smaller every second.  But maybe to him the more was growing ever larger.  Anyways, he just holds very still and we stay that way for a full 10 seconds looking at each other.  He still has my wallet in one of his massive paws.  I make a very brief statement.  “Drop my wallet and crawl away.”  To this he complied.  He dropped the wallet immediately and backpedaled away for several yards before getting up to a rather shaky run.  This is where many people differ on what I should have done.  I should have called the Police, or I should have held Mongo until Police arrived.  All I wanted to do was to be home with my family.  Right or Wrong, I bugged out.  I drove home.  I didn’t call anyone. Maybe I should have called the Police and had him taken off to jail to be taught a lesson.  Or maybe I had already taught him lesson enough.  Monday rolled in and I sold the PPK.  I picked up a .45 the same day.  The nightmares of Mongo laughing at my PPK was just uncool.  I had doubts as to what a .380 could have done had this guy decided to take it up a notch.  I’m not saying anything about .380s, just my impression.  I think if he wanted too, he would have had me.  I’m just lucky he decided not to try me further.  I was just glade to have survived.