A South Carolina man was forced to use his gun in self-defense after a co-worker pulled a gun of her own and pointed it at him on Wednesday. Police in Rock Hill, South Carolina say a workplace dispute spilled out onto the streets around 3 p.m. on Wednesday, when officers were dispatched to a report of a shooting.
When they arrived, they found a woman suffering from gunshot wounds. In the course of their investigation, they learned that the woman who was shot was actually the initial aggressor, and had help from another co-worker.
A man was detained at the scene but was not charged, police said. Another woman, identified as 32-year-old Brittney Reed, was charged with Assault and Battery.
The shooting stems from an altercation between two co-workers, according to police. The female co-worker got into Reed’s car while the male co-worker got in his car and started driving away.
Reed allegedly drove in front of the man’s vehicle to block him while he was stuck in traffic. This was when the woman approached the man’s vehicle from the passenger side and presented a firearm.
Police said the man grabbed his own firearm and fired it at the woman, hitting her multiple times in the chest.
Reed then punched the man in the face, but backed off after he told her to get away, police said.
This is the second defensive gun use I’ve covered this week that stemmed from someone who became needlessly violent over a simple dispute when they could have just walked or driven away. In the previous case, it was a guy who pulled a knife and threatened an Arizona gun owner over a parking space.
Now a woman is dead because she and her coworker just couldn’t let go of whatever dispute they had with the victim. Authorities haven’t said what prompted the altercation, but the women had plenty of options beyond trapping the man in traffic and pulling a gun on him. Once she and her accomplice decided to escalate the dispute to the point of threatening the man’s life, however, the victim himself was left with only one choice: shoot to save his life or risk being shot and killed himself.
I don’t know about you, but when I got my first concealed carry permit and started carrying for self-defense, I didn’t think much about having to defend myself against some random act of aggression. I was more concerned with being robbed, not being killed because I pulled into the wrong parking space or ticked off a colleague.
Maybe these types of attacks aren’t becoming more common. It’s hard to tell based on nothing more than news reports, but at the same time, it just feels like there are a lot of folks who are ready and willing to pop off over the smallest of disputes and for the stupidest reasons these days. We don’t just have to be concerned about being robbed at an ATM or carjacked at a stop light. Even a simple trip to the grocery store or an average day on the job can end in a violent encounter with a stranger or co-worker, which is all the more reason to always be carrying.
