Store Owner with Gun Channels Indiana Jones After Man with Sword Allegedly Threatens Him
Pro tip: Don’t try Indiana Jones villain stuff on store owners. You never know when you might run into Indiana Jones.
This appears to have been the unfortunate lesson learned by Theodore Scoville.
I don’t particularly want to see anyone getting killed. But if you’re the kind of person who thinks that swinging a sword in the face of a liquor store owner is a good idea, well, yes — you’re probably going to end up dead.
According to WCBS-TV, a man who tried this move on the operator of a liquor store ended up learning that lesson the hard way.
Police in Port Jefferson, New York, say the 50-year-old man in question was killed shortly after 2 p.m. on Thursday.
“He had a sword beneath a poncho, it seems to be without saying a word, he pulled the sword out, swung it three times — at least three times — at a very close distance to the person behind the counter,” Suffolk County Homicide Chief Det. Lt. Kevin Beyrer told WABC-TV.
“It’s unclear why the 50-year-old brought the sword into the store, but CBS2’s Jennifer McLogan reports that authorities have confirmed the store worker’s account of the shooting,” WCBS reported.
So, what did the store owner do?
Shoot him.
“Officials said the incident does not appear to be a robbery attempt and the store owner’s gun was legal. He is not expected to be charged,” WABC-TV reported.
In case you’ve forgotten the scene I was talking about previously from “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” here you go:
Gun tends to win, both in the movies and in real life.
The store worker, who remains unnamed, will likely not be charged in the shooting. After all, when a sword is swung around in your face, you do what you have to — and, in this case, what you have to do is whatever gets you out of danger.
“It was a matter of seconds between the time that the guy walked in and the time he was shot,” Beyrer told Newsday. He added there was “no time” to call 911.
Scoville also had a hunting knife, according to Beyrer, so it was clear that he meant business.
“The person walked in, he had a sword underneath a poncho. It seems to be, without saying a word, he pulled the sword out and swung it three times, at least three times, at a very close distance to the person behind the counter at the liquor store. At that time, the liquor store owner grabbed the gun and shot him once,” Beyrer said.
While Beyrer said that Scoville had problems — “From what we gathered, he’s had a troubled last few years,” Beyrer said — he declined to say whether he’d had any history of mental illness or previous encounters with the police.
It was an unusual crime for Port Jefferson, a Long Island village described as “quaint” by Newsday.
“It just doesn’t happen,” Port Jefferson Deputy Mayor Stanley Loucks told the outlet. “It’s very unusual here.”
”The worst thing that happens on East Main Street is jaywalking,” Jamie Sackstein, an area graduate student, said.
Obviously, this is a tragedy. Obviously, Scoville had issues.
However, even he should have known how this would have ended. And, as for the store owner — as if we have to remind you, this is why a good guy with a gun is the best way to dispatch a bad guy with a weapon. Without the ability to defend himself, who knows what would have happened?
Yes, this ended tragically. But the other ending — the store owner being killed — would have been even worse.
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