Carjacked

Rikter8

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Has anyone here been Carjacked before?

I think I came VERY close tonight to having a confrontation with a carjacker.

We were enjoying time in Flint at the car show, and it was getting late - we were starting to pack up as was everyone else.
Many people around, but getting dark and a bit scary.
The police got scarce (as usual), and the crowd turned ghetto fast.
I packed up our stuff, had our camera bags out, and was tucking them away in the hatch.

I had this guy come up out of nowhere, look at the car, then stand at the light post directly behind me. Distance was about 2 feet.
I thought he was looking at speakers that I had in the car for sale. But...he just stood there silent.
I turned around and said "Yes?"
He sat there silent
So I said, "Whats up?" louder so he could hear me, and others.

Then he asked "ever take dis to da top speed?"
I answered, "yea"
He asked "It fast?"
I said "I dont know"
He said nothing...just stared at the car.
I stood there ready, staring at him waiting for his move - but he just stood there.

My co-workers were parked next to me, and they stood up and came over. Then he just rolled himself off the pole, and walked away in the opposite direction.

I dont know if he was hoping to snag a camera, or try to steal the car.
Thinking the latter since his questions were about the car.
I do think he was sizing me up, and the situation in the event he couldn't overtake me.
When the co-workers came into the picture, he was outnumbered.

Any experiences?
 
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jason_els

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That's really creepy. You're lucky your friends were still around. The car plus the camera equipment made for a tempting target. I'm glad you're safe.
 

Dave NoCal

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I had a friendly gym acquaintance once who was carjacked at midday in Midtown Atlanta, 10th and Peachtree to be precise. He was stopped at the light and two guys just opened his door, pulled him out of the car, and shot him eight times in the abdomen. They took the car and left him lying in the street. Fortunately he was just a few blocks from Crawford Long Hospital and they missed his spine. He was not expected to live but did. He had a very sexy surgical scar from sternum to pubes.
Rikter, I'm glad you are alright. The situation definitely sounded very dangerous.
Dave
 

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What a frightening experience. I'm glad you are OK. I am always careful to park in well lit areas near help if it becomes necessary. I also have a police whistle on my car key chain and mace in the glove compartment.
 

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I dont wish to sound naive or confrontational but when I see that someone is nearly car jacked I immediately presume someone actually tried to do something. This guy was only asking questions about your car, it's a whole other step to stealing your car. As I read your story, to me, it sounded as if he was merely interested and asking questions.

He may have indeed been a bit suspect, but you were far from car jacked. I'm not in the slightest bit street, but you were a long way off being carjacked. Also, the pigeon english way you wrote how he spoke made me feel kinda sad.
 

jason_els

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I dont wish to sound naive or confrontational but when I see that someone is nearly car jacked I immediately presume someone actually tried to do something. This guy was only asking questions about your car, it's a whole other step to stealing your car. As I read your story, to me, it sounded as if he was merely interested and asking questions.

He may have indeed been a bit suspect, but you were far from car jacked. I'm not in the slightest bit street, but you were a long way off being carjacked. Also, the pigeon english way you wrote how he spoke made me feel kinda sad.

It happened in Flint. If you've never been to a US rust belt city then it may be difficult to imagine. Such intense poverty is difficult for other westerners to conceptualize.

I'm a big believer in listening to your sixth sense. Two feet is waaay too close for personal space in a strange parking lot, in the dark, with lots of valuable equipment, in one of the most crime-ridden cities in the country. This guy had no declared purpose, didn't say anything except asking how fast the car went, and was standing right behind Rikter in an open lot. If your spidey sense doesn't go off in that kind of situation, then you shouldn't be on the streets. And if you are that suspicious guy then you should know your actions are intimidating and alarming.

If it feels wrong then it probably is. It's much safer to listen to your intuition.
 

Skull Mason

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Maybe he was a car lover and was admiring your car since you were at a car show. What if he was white, would you think he was trying to carjack you?
 

Rikter8

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He may have indeed been a bit suspect, but you were far from car jacked. I'm not in the slightest bit street, but you were a long way off being carjacked. Also, the pigeon english way you wrote how he spoke made me feel kinda sad.

I wasn't that far off from being either Carjacked or ripped off. This was one of many scenario's of "before event" crime happens.
The pigeon english was put in my post because it shows the caliber of person I was dealing with.
My point was my experience with it, and to reflect and learn from others that have been.

Have you ever visited a Midwest US slum area town?

Sure, mabee it was nothing - and that's fine. It was just creepy to stand directly behind me.
Not only did it invade my personal space - which for me is very small... but seemed iconic of what you hear.


Maybe he was a car lover and was admiring your car since you were at a car show. What if he was white, would you think he was trying to carjack you?

True...but why would he slip up the side, then try to stand behind me where I couldn't see him. Then sit there and dead stare.. Not looking around... Just dead stare at the back of the car. He had his hands tucked behind him so I couldnt see.
The car show at that point was over... there were just a few folks lingering around, along with other cars, but we were all packing up to go.

Color doesn't matter. There's as much white trash as there is black trash in Flint. It didn't make the Nations Crime Capital for nothing. The ghetto language follows to both sides as well.
 
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lucky8

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A couple years ago I was leaving my buddies house around 3 in the morning. I walked out the front door and saw someone in his car trying to hot wire it. I ran up to him, hit him in the face, then he stabbed me in the arm with a screw driver. Needless to say, he didn't get the car...but I did have to get stitches
 

jason_els

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I will tell you the truth. Color doesn't matter one bit. How someone dresses does to a degree, but what really tips you off is behavior. We sense odd or threatening behavior long before our conscious minds become aware of it. Our brains are phenomenally good at examining faces and bodily movement. We know who is threatening or abnormal almost immediately and our brains look at that first, not color.

I've crossed the street or ducked into shops or avoided empty streets for all kinds of people. I once took the wrong exit off the GWB and ended-up in upper Harlem at 175th Street rather than the Harlem River Drive. This was in the late 80s and I knew I fucked it up the minute I did it. There was grass growing between the blacktop, junk of all kinds along the side of the exit and in the road. It looked like a war zone with old couches, shopping carts, rug remnants, and tons of plastic crap. I thought I'd make a legal U-turn or something like that but at the end of the long ramp, just before Amsterdam Ave, was a barricade with a bunch of kids holding clubs and bats who popped over the top and started coming for my car. To this day I don't remember if they were all black or latino or a mix. All I saw were the threatening gestures and their weapons and I put my (thankfully tiny) Omni into reverse and drove down the exit the wrong way.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, I drove down a GWB exit ramp THE WRONG WAY into ONCOMING TRAFFIC. As far as I was concerned, I had nothing to lose. If I was in an accident it would still be better than staying on that ramp. I reached the end of the exit, hauled the steering wheel as far to the right as it would go, and got on the ramp to the Harlem River Drive. I just floored it right in between oncoming cars and prayed that a cop would see me and give me a ticket, thus protecting me from the mob at the end of the exit ramp (I was young and naive). That didn't happen and I continued on my way to my sister's apartment.

I guess the point is that it didn't matter what color the hooligans at the end of the ramp were. If they had been white I would have done the exact same thing because of how they behaved, not their color. Where I live there are relatively few black people. The majority of crimes are committed by white people to other white people. Few are stranger-on-stranger violent crimes, but the fact remains that crooks are crooks no matter what color they are and it pays to be wary of anyone who doesn't behave like everyone else in public situations where isolation or darkness tips the scales in favor of the crooks.
 

Skull Mason

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I wasn't that far off from being either Carjacked or ripped off. This was one of many scenario's of "before event" crime happens.
The pigeon english was put in my post because it shows the caliber of person I was dealing with.
My point was my experience with it, and to reflect and learn from others that have been.

Have you ever visited a Midwest US slum area town?

Sure, mabee it was nothing - and that's fine. It was just creepy to stand directly behind me.
Not only did it invade my personal space - which for me is very small... but seemed iconic of what you hear.




True...but why would he slip up the side, then try to stand behind me where I couldn't see him. Then sit there and dead stare.. Not looking around... Just dead stare at the back of the car. He had his hands tucked behind him so I couldnt see.
The car show at that point was over... there were just a few folks lingering around, along with other cars, but we were all packing up to go.

Color doesn't matter. There's as much white trash as there is black trash in Flint. It didn't make the Nations Crime Capital for nothing. The ghetto language follows to both sides as well.

This is just as much a response to you as it is Jason. But in your case Jason, there was a visible threat of a mob with weapons. At that point of course color doesn't matter. But I think, in this case, color does matter. If the man who rolled up to you Rikter was a white male, wearing a Van Halen concert T from the 80s, or better yet was wearing a hugh boss dress shirt, and was speaking "proper" dialect, you may have engaged him differently.

For instance, the man you encountered had his hands behind his back. You assumed he was hiding a weapon of some sort. Have you ever seen people milling around at a museum, and how they look at the exhibits with their hands behind their backs? I would assume that at a car show there is a lot of admiring of people's cars in the lot. The parking lot itself is almost like it's own amateur car show. People milling around and admiring other cars. If it was a well dressed white dude who didn't speak "pigeon" you might take him for a man with a genuine interest in your speakers or car. Do you really think he would carjack you in front of other people like that? To me it is like a star wars fan going to a star wars convention and robbing a fellow star wars fan of his admiral ackbar figurine.

By you using his use of vernacular as a sign of the "caliber" of the person you were dealing with, you are making a severe judgmental error in my opinion. I know the "ghetto language" extends to all races; I speak that shit too. Although I would be considered highly educated based upon my degree or compared to others. I have friends who can't speak "proper" english, but that doesn't make them a criminal, nor does it make them stupid, nor does it make them a criminal. We all speak that ghetto shit, white and black, and our records are clean (for the most part).

I wasn't there, so I'm not going to pretend to know if you were about to jacked or not. You may have been about to get jacked, but I think you jumped to conclusions way too quickly, even if that is your mind's way of protecting you; survival instinct. In that case it may have been fair to treat him as a threat no matter what just to be safe, but you say color doesn't matter yet you have made many assumptions that are in fact based upon his color and dialect. If the dude was a white male drinking a bud light you wouldn't have made this thread here today.
 

Rikter8

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But I think, in this case, color does matter. If the man who rolled up to you Rikter was a white male, wearing a Van Halen concert T from the 80s, or better yet was wearing a hugh boss dress shirt, and was speaking "proper" dialect, you may have engaged him differently.

If the dude was a white male drinking a bud light you wouldn't have made this thread here today.

Baloney.
I watch my car like a hawk, and shoo away anybody - including the mayor (and I have) if they get too close or touch the car.
I even have signs up that say, "Please admire but don't Lean on, Sit in or on, or use as a personal stool". Why? Because people (All people) are just plain dumb sometimes.

Color didn't matter. Please stop throwing the race card in this.
I didn't say he was black did I? You ASSUMED he was an african american or something other than white.
Your right, you weren't there, so you cannot assume he was one race or creed or the other.
The reason I didnt specify which, is because it DOESNT matter!
Simply put, a MAN APPROACHED ME AND WAS SUSPICIOUS.
And you can't say that only black folks use broken dialect.

The only person inserting the race card here - is YOU. So please, rip it up, and throw it away.

Do you really think he would carjack you in front of other people like that?

Damn right I do. There's a clear shot to I-475 and a somewhat clear shot to I-75 from our location. His chances of getting away were very good.
Plus, it got dark, and most of the police had left, and many of the cars left on the streets had owners drinking in the taverns.

It's our own faults for staying that late in all places at night...Flint. However this was supposed to be an event with tight security, and a revival to bring people back to the city.

Really Skull.... this thread has no hidden agenda. It's simply an experience that I had, and I'm inquiring if any others have had similar encounters, and their opinions.
That's all.
 
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Skull Mason

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I didn't say he was black did I? You ASSUMED he was an african american or something other than white.

And you can't say that only black folks use broken dialect.

Really Skull.... this thread has no hidden agenda. It's simply an experience that I had, and I'm inquiring if any others have had similar encounters, and their opinions.
That's all.

I didn't need to assume, you made it quite obvious with how you referred to him. I never said only black people use that dialect, I'm white and I use it from time to time. I never called you a racist, nor did I assume you had a hidden agenda with this thread, I was just playing devil's advocate and trying to let you in on that fact that you could be wrong. However, you being defensive about it and bringing up the fact that you don't have a hidden agenda makes me think twice. We all make judgements and associations;

Take this test

But what did you mean by the "caliber" of the person you were dealing with? You certainly were belittling the dude as a human, if nothing else. A human, who may have in fact shared your love of cars and just been admiring your car.