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This is another Colt-related story.
Again, the story is true, all names have been changed:
The festivities leading up to this Thursday are under way, and I was over at a friend's house for a "light" snack last night. BURP.
One of their brothers was home from Florida, where he retired after 20 years in the East St. Louis Illinois police department.
Having met before, and both being interested, we talked guns and shooting. He told me a really good story about his "Big Night" back in the 70's. Being a "collector" of interesting tales, I pumped him dry about this one.
"Frank" was a veteran robbery/homicide investigator in East St. Louis back when the REAL slide downward started. To those of us here in the Mid-West, East St. Louie is synonymous with "Beirut", "Afghanistan", "Mogadishu", and "Hellhole".
The city, (if you're brave, or stupid enough to drive through) looks like a bombed-out version of any of them.
East St. Louis was always a mess, but in the 70's the descent accelerated with the speed of a fighter going down in flames, liberally fueled by left-wing Democratic racial politics and Federal welfare money.
Frank and his partner John were working evening watch one summer night, when they heard a call for a silent alarm at "the old Jews place" pawnshop, in their area. John rolled on it while Frank called them in on it, on the radio.
Also calling in on it were "The Animal Twins".
The Twins were a "salt and pepper" team, black and white. Twin Number One was black, 6 feet 4 inches tall. Twin Number Two was white 5 feet 7 inches tall.
The Twins were bodybuilding and squad car partners. They called them "The Animal Twins" because they were as strong as animals, stuck together like a pack, and behaved like animals to criminals. Like most cops, they hated crooks, but these two HATED crooks.
The unmarked rolled to a stop, just down the street from the "Old Jews Place", first on the scene.
They named it for the old Jewish man who ran the place, and who refused to leave the by now, rotted neighborhood.
John used the radio, as Frank stepped from the car, drawing his new Colt .357 Magnum Python. He had bought it at a famous old gun store in downtown St. Louis Missouri, when he made detective.
There were regulations about what caliber guns were to be carried by ESLPD officer's, but in a town of almost daily riots, armed confrontations with "activist's", suspect police shootings, absolutely runaway crime, and a city wholly consumed by the Black Power/radical civil rights movement, nobody had time to question what a cop had in his holster at 10:00 at night.
Frank approached the front of the pawnshop, noting that it was still as he remembered it. The sidewalk was unusually narrow in front, not more than 4 feet wide; a battered Caddy parked too close to the curb. The storefront had the obligatory steel bars on the front window, and the view inside was obstructed by the filthy glass.
Inside the store "LeRoy McCann", and his new partner "Bobby Martin" (known and despised by all as "Booby", were finishing up their robbery. The Old Jew was dying on the floor after the viscous and completely unnecessary beating both had given him with their cheap revolvers, feet, and fists. The "take" of about $15.00 was in LeRoy's pocket.
LeRoy heard the sound of the cops outside and yelled for Booby to leave the old man and run.
LeRoy was "the brains" of the pair, which is to say, he had enough sense to know the police weren't going to be pleased at the murder of a harmless old man.
Being the "brain" LeRoy told Booby to beat it out the front.
Booby being a violent little heroin addict and murderer out on his latest parole, but not too bright, headed out the front door. LeRoy, as a superior thinker, slipped to the back of the store where there was a door into the alley.
Frank crept up the sidewalk to the side of the front window, and seeing nothing through the dirty glass, moved low, toward the door.
He was on the narrow section of the sidewalk, between the store's barred front window and the Caddy, when Booby came flying out the door and almost ran over him.
Booby instinctively fired his .32, probably in surprise, more than in an attempt to hit Frank, but hit Frank he did.
Shot in the left side just above the belt line Frank fell sideways against the Caddy and slipped down to a half lying, half sitting position facing the store.
Booby, itching and needing a fix, started to run past Frank's fallen body, but saw John standing by the car still holding the radio mike in one hand and a Colt .45 Automatic in the other. He turned back the other way but saw about 50% of the police cars in town heading his way down the street.
Booby made the fatal mistake. Instead of doing SOMETHING, he stood there shifting back and forth on his feet trying to decide what to do.
The fact that he was now standing directly above and in front of Frank didn't register.
Frank, now in shock, came to to see Booby, gun in hand, looming over him.
In a daze from shock, Frank didn't hesitate. Bringing his new Python up, he fired what seemed a brilliant fireball up into Booby. Booby seemed to stand up, then leaned over toward Frank again with the .32.
Thinking he was about to be finished off by Booby, he fired upward again.
Again the fireball floated upward into Booby.
Again Booby stood up, then leaned over again toward Frank.
Shocky and bleeding badly, Frank desperately fired again and again.
Suddenly Booby seemed to disappear....just GONE, and Frank passed out.
Meanwhile, the Animal Twins roared into the alley, and bailed out of their squad car, with their trademark personally owned Remington 870 12 Gage shotguns in hand.
Brainy LeRoy burst through the door and into the alley, making one of his famous getaways, as usual leaving his partner to face the music.
This time things didn't quite work out as usual.
LeRoy found to his horror that he was facing the Animal Twins, and they hatred LeRoy BAD, after he had beat a case for raping and nearly killing a 9 year old girl the year before.
While LeRoy was out on bail, the only witness, the girls mother, had been beaten nearly to death and wouldn't testify against LeRoy.
For once LeRoy made a bad decision. He raised the .38 revolver he held, possibly to drop it, but alas, he was a little slow. Each of the Animal Twins fired two rounds of 00 buckshot at LeRoy at a range of about 10 feet.
Hit by 4 rounds of 00, LeRoy, (as the Twins would later tell it) "just kind of fell apart".
John and the other arriving officers tossed Frank into a squad car and headed to the hospital at 90 miles an hour.
LeRoy and Booby had no need of a ride.
After surgery to remove the .32 slug, Frank asked John what the hell had happened with Booby.
He fired and fired, but Booby kept trying to lean over and shoot him.
John laughed and explained that when Frank had fired the first shot from the Python, Booby had been blown back against the steel bars on the pawnshop window.
With his knees locked he started to topple over forward, when Frank's next shot had slammed into him and blown him back against the bars again.
Each time he toppled forward, Frank met him with another Magnum round. This continued until the sixth round from the Python hit him, when finally his legs buckled and he fell sideways.
Booby was almost certainly dead with the first shot.
The coroner, in checking out "the remains of the day", found LeRoy in the alley, almost cut in half, and the Twins trying manfully to appear remorseful at taking poor LeRoy's worthless life.
When the coroner rolled Booby over, he said in a somewhat shocked voice, "My God I can see right through him like he's a screen door".
Glancing behind him, he saw most of Booby sprayed over the window and bars of the store.
The usual hosing down by the fire department wouldn't cut it this time.
According to Frank, things in East St Lou were so bad, the incident barely made the back pages of the paper.
Frank finished his 20 and retired to sunny Florida without a backward look. He's never been back to East St. Louis, and says he never will.
He has a Florida CCW, and his carry gun is a well-worn, blue steel, 4 inch Colt Python.
Again, the story is true, all names have been changed:
The festivities leading up to this Thursday are under way, and I was over at a friend's house for a "light" snack last night. BURP.
One of their brothers was home from Florida, where he retired after 20 years in the East St. Louis Illinois police department.
Having met before, and both being interested, we talked guns and shooting. He told me a really good story about his "Big Night" back in the 70's. Being a "collector" of interesting tales, I pumped him dry about this one.
"Frank" was a veteran robbery/homicide investigator in East St. Louis back when the REAL slide downward started. To those of us here in the Mid-West, East St. Louie is synonymous with "Beirut", "Afghanistan", "Mogadishu", and "Hellhole".
The city, (if you're brave, or stupid enough to drive through) looks like a bombed-out version of any of them.
East St. Louis was always a mess, but in the 70's the descent accelerated with the speed of a fighter going down in flames, liberally fueled by left-wing Democratic racial politics and Federal welfare money.
Frank and his partner John were working evening watch one summer night, when they heard a call for a silent alarm at "the old Jews place" pawnshop, in their area. John rolled on it while Frank called them in on it, on the radio.
Also calling in on it were "The Animal Twins".
The Twins were a "salt and pepper" team, black and white. Twin Number One was black, 6 feet 4 inches tall. Twin Number Two was white 5 feet 7 inches tall.
The Twins were bodybuilding and squad car partners. They called them "The Animal Twins" because they were as strong as animals, stuck together like a pack, and behaved like animals to criminals. Like most cops, they hated crooks, but these two HATED crooks.
The unmarked rolled to a stop, just down the street from the "Old Jews Place", first on the scene.
They named it for the old Jewish man who ran the place, and who refused to leave the by now, rotted neighborhood.
John used the radio, as Frank stepped from the car, drawing his new Colt .357 Magnum Python. He had bought it at a famous old gun store in downtown St. Louis Missouri, when he made detective.
There were regulations about what caliber guns were to be carried by ESLPD officer's, but in a town of almost daily riots, armed confrontations with "activist's", suspect police shootings, absolutely runaway crime, and a city wholly consumed by the Black Power/radical civil rights movement, nobody had time to question what a cop had in his holster at 10:00 at night.
Frank approached the front of the pawnshop, noting that it was still as he remembered it. The sidewalk was unusually narrow in front, not more than 4 feet wide; a battered Caddy parked too close to the curb. The storefront had the obligatory steel bars on the front window, and the view inside was obstructed by the filthy glass.
Inside the store "LeRoy McCann", and his new partner "Bobby Martin" (known and despised by all as "Booby", were finishing up their robbery. The Old Jew was dying on the floor after the viscous and completely unnecessary beating both had given him with their cheap revolvers, feet, and fists. The "take" of about $15.00 was in LeRoy's pocket.
LeRoy heard the sound of the cops outside and yelled for Booby to leave the old man and run.
LeRoy was "the brains" of the pair, which is to say, he had enough sense to know the police weren't going to be pleased at the murder of a harmless old man.
Being the "brain" LeRoy told Booby to beat it out the front.
Booby being a violent little heroin addict and murderer out on his latest parole, but not too bright, headed out the front door. LeRoy, as a superior thinker, slipped to the back of the store where there was a door into the alley.
Frank crept up the sidewalk to the side of the front window, and seeing nothing through the dirty glass, moved low, toward the door.
He was on the narrow section of the sidewalk, between the store's barred front window and the Caddy, when Booby came flying out the door and almost ran over him.
Booby instinctively fired his .32, probably in surprise, more than in an attempt to hit Frank, but hit Frank he did.
Shot in the left side just above the belt line Frank fell sideways against the Caddy and slipped down to a half lying, half sitting position facing the store.
Booby, itching and needing a fix, started to run past Frank's fallen body, but saw John standing by the car still holding the radio mike in one hand and a Colt .45 Automatic in the other. He turned back the other way but saw about 50% of the police cars in town heading his way down the street.
Booby made the fatal mistake. Instead of doing SOMETHING, he stood there shifting back and forth on his feet trying to decide what to do.
The fact that he was now standing directly above and in front of Frank didn't register.
Frank, now in shock, came to to see Booby, gun in hand, looming over him.
In a daze from shock, Frank didn't hesitate. Bringing his new Python up, he fired what seemed a brilliant fireball up into Booby. Booby seemed to stand up, then leaned over toward Frank again with the .32.
Thinking he was about to be finished off by Booby, he fired upward again.
Again the fireball floated upward into Booby.
Again Booby stood up, then leaned over again toward Frank.
Shocky and bleeding badly, Frank desperately fired again and again.
Suddenly Booby seemed to disappear....just GONE, and Frank passed out.
Meanwhile, the Animal Twins roared into the alley, and bailed out of their squad car, with their trademark personally owned Remington 870 12 Gage shotguns in hand.
Brainy LeRoy burst through the door and into the alley, making one of his famous getaways, as usual leaving his partner to face the music.
This time things didn't quite work out as usual.
LeRoy found to his horror that he was facing the Animal Twins, and they hatred LeRoy BAD, after he had beat a case for raping and nearly killing a 9 year old girl the year before.
While LeRoy was out on bail, the only witness, the girls mother, had been beaten nearly to death and wouldn't testify against LeRoy.
For once LeRoy made a bad decision. He raised the .38 revolver he held, possibly to drop it, but alas, he was a little slow. Each of the Animal Twins fired two rounds of 00 buckshot at LeRoy at a range of about 10 feet.
Hit by 4 rounds of 00, LeRoy, (as the Twins would later tell it) "just kind of fell apart".
John and the other arriving officers tossed Frank into a squad car and headed to the hospital at 90 miles an hour.
LeRoy and Booby had no need of a ride.
After surgery to remove the .32 slug, Frank asked John what the hell had happened with Booby.
He fired and fired, but Booby kept trying to lean over and shoot him.
John laughed and explained that when Frank had fired the first shot from the Python, Booby had been blown back against the steel bars on the pawnshop window.
With his knees locked he started to topple over forward, when Frank's next shot had slammed into him and blown him back against the bars again.
Each time he toppled forward, Frank met him with another Magnum round. This continued until the sixth round from the Python hit him, when finally his legs buckled and he fell sideways.
Booby was almost certainly dead with the first shot.
The coroner, in checking out "the remains of the day", found LeRoy in the alley, almost cut in half, and the Twins trying manfully to appear remorseful at taking poor LeRoy's worthless life.
When the coroner rolled Booby over, he said in a somewhat shocked voice, "My God I can see right through him like he's a screen door".
Glancing behind him, he saw most of Booby sprayed over the window and bars of the store.
The usual hosing down by the fire department wouldn't cut it this time.
According to Frank, things in East St Lou were so bad, the incident barely made the back pages of the paper.
Frank finished his 20 and retired to sunny Florida without a backward look. He's never been back to East St. Louis, and says he never will.
He has a Florida CCW, and his carry gun is a well-worn, blue steel, 4 inch Colt Python.
