Okay.
Since we're frugal firearms, we're going to start with a person
who has their first $30 to spend.
Would you spend that first $30 on a good flashlight or would you spend
that first $30 on a can of pepper spray?
Oh, I'd spend it on the pepper spray.
Cause you can get a couple of cans.
Uh, you can get two cans of spray for 30 bucks and you're not going to get a
good flashlight, probably for 30.
Yeah.
That's, that's probably true.
Welcome to episode eight.
Number eight of the frugal firearms podcast.
And today is a different kind of show because we're not talking firearms.
Uh, we're talking non-lethal and less lethal options to firearms.
And why would we do that?
Well, frugal is part of the name, right?
And what's the most expensive day of your life?
Ken, my cohost, tell us what the most expensive day of your life would be.
The most expensive day of your life would be the day in which you have to defend
yourself, particularly with a firearm.
Yeah.
And why is that?
Because of all the costs that are going to be associated with defending
yourself after the fact.
And this is why it's encouraged that if you're going to carry a firearm, get
insurance and that's an upcoming topic.
We do have a, uh, this is actually probably part one of what will probably
become a three-part series, although not necessarily in consecutive order.
Where today we're going to talk pepper spray as an option to lethal force.
We're going to be having on a representative of one of the major legal defense firms.
And then we're also going to be covering, you know, the fighting mindset for the
street, and that's actually going to come via a 20 year policeman, uh, who now
teaches martial arts and this isn't a martial arts show, but the mindset of the
fighter is still the same no matter what the tool is, right?
So we're going to be bringing on our guest who is going to be giving you
information about probably something you haven't really thought about, which is
pepper spray, when it's deployable, why you should consider it as part of your
EDC and what the pitfalls are because every option has a pitfall, right Ken?
Absolutely.
So let's go ahead and get to it.
So welcome to the show, Joe Girmesi from CCW USA.
And we're going to be talking pepper spray and non and less lethal self-defense options.
So Joe, welcome to the show and give us a little bit of a
background on how you became interested in this, how you got involved and what
you've learned from teaching these classes and what you want people who are
never going to be in San Diego and who are maybe never going to be able to meet
you in person or attend one of your classes.
Give us all the stuff that you want them to know.
Okay.
Well, thank you, Craig.
I'm happy to be here.
And, um, yeah, in terms of how I got involved in this, I'm relatively new,
actually, I mean, new concern, like a lot of the people I talk to in the gun
industry, you know, I hear they've been doing this for 40 years, but I'm
doing this for 40 years and all that kind of stuff.
So I really seriously got back into it about 10 years ago and, um, started out
with handguns and, um, got into competitive shooting and USPSA shooting.
And was doing that really every weekend, pretty much up to COVID until that kind
of, uh, disrupted things a bit, but getting interested in the, uh, the non-lethal
stuff where that came from was getting my concealed carry license.
And when, um, when I got into concealed carry and, you know, being an instructor
and a teacher, I'm always into, I take a lot of classes, I'm always trying
to learn stuff like that.
One of the things that was, um, that I'd realize, you know, becoming a concealed
carrier is I got more and more into that is that very few problems are gun problems.
Um, you know, there's a very tiny window where you're actually justified in using
deadly force to defend yourself.
Um, but there's a very large window of things that happen that, um, you know,
other things may be appropriate responses to them and, um, having some kind of
non-lethal response is a really good thing.
Cause like I said, most of the things you're likely to run into are not, you
know, a gun is not an appropriate response to them.
And even, you know, if we, cause we always, we talk about, you know, encountering
violent criminals, which is a definite possibility out there, which is the
reason we carry, but there's other violent people that aren't necessarily criminals.
Um, you know, if you remember the people in, um, the people in school, when you
were a kid, the bullies, those kinds of people, um, the ones that used to fight
all the time and beat people up, a lot of them didn't grow out of it.
I don't know if it's a lot of them, but a significant amount of them
don't grow out of that stuff.
They're the people that start fights with people, you know, in the line in
and out, and they want to fight over parking places and things like that.
And, um, those are the people that you're more likely to run into.
And those are people that are, uh, you know, appropriate candidates
for pepper spray really.
So it has a lot of different uses.
There's a lot of different things that happen that, like I said, a gun's
not an appropriate response, but pepper spray is, and it gives you something
between not doing anything at all.
And, you know, having nothing other than a gun.
So, um, then that's where I finally, I started to realize that as I, you know,
found myself carrying every day.
So that's, that's how I got interested in looking into that more.
Did you ever find yourself in a situation where, you know, when you started
carrying and there was nothing else in your holster or in your pocket, and the
only other option was to either verbally disengage or run away that you thought,
oh man, I actually could have used this.
Or was it more of a theoretical?
No, it was more of a theoretical.
I've been, again, fortunate.
And I like to, I like to think I've cracked this good situational awareness
because, you know, the, the two classes we were talking about, the pepper
spray class and the CCW next next steps class.
Um, I spend the majority of the class, you know, telling people how to avoid
situations because that's, you win every fight that you avoid and, and that's
what I tell people is like, you know, you want to be paying attention because.
In the case of criminals, um, you know, criminals are predators and they do very
specific things to when they select, you know, their victims, their prey.
And if you're paying attention, a lot of times you can see, a lot of times
the things that they're doing are not normal things that everyday people do.
And if you're paying attention, you'll notice that kind of stuff.
And one of the things I'll tell students is, you know, awareness
buys you time, time buys you options.
The sooner you see something developing, the more options you have.
If you don't notice, you know, an attacker or criminal until they're right on you,
then your options are really limited.
So the more you're paying attention, uh, the sooner you can see something,
the more options you have.
So that's, you know, really what we try to teach people.
And I hope I practice that.
So maybe that's why I haven't really been in that, that kind of a situation.
I've gotten, I've, you know, I've had the pepper spray staged in my hand before,
but I've never had to really use it.
You're fortunate.
Definitely.
I took light, the right light rail system here in San Diego, the trolley
system for 17 years.
Yeah, that's another thing I avoid.
So yeah, that could be.
And I saw pretty much everything at one point in time during those
17 years on the trolley.
Sometimes it'd be, you know, your normal eight to five work type of thing.
Uh, sometimes it was coming home very late at night and I pretty
much saw one of everything.
And I was probably in 17 years, I were probably four or five times when
people came up to me and began to threaten me.
Um, but I'm generally speaking, a big guy, uh, just over six foot tall and,
and, you know, solidly built Craig would probably agree with that statement.
And I oftentimes just sometimes carrying a first, my briefcase back in the day.
And then my laptop bag.
And first thing I would do is I'd hold my, you know, my laptop or my
briefcase between me and the idiot who's trying to scream at me or do something
like that, a lot of these people are mentally ill and you don't know what
the heck's going to go on.
And sometimes in a car like that, when you're in a train like that, you can see
the problem occurring further down the car.
And at the next stop, I would get off, run up to the next car and get on.
Just as you say, avoid it because you win everything that you avoid.
Absolutely.
Yeah. And if you think about that too, the incidents that you've
saw the couple that you just mentioned, you know, were any of those something
where you would have felt that, okay, it's appropriate to use a firearm
here to defend myself?
Um, I saw only one circumstance in all the time I've ever doing it, where,
um, a guy came in with a woman and, uh, he was sitting down with her and he had
a buck knife about four and a half inch blade buck knife and he had it out and
he was rubbing it up against her throat and she was completely ignoring him.
And I'm like, this is not good.
This must be some sort of a, I don't know.
It was a hostage situation.
She wouldn't look at me, but I didn't think it was a hostage situation.
I think it was just her involved with some really bad boyfriend type of deal.
And he had the knife and I'm sitting there going, he's sitting across from me.
He's about six feet away from me and I got nothing.
And I'm saying, if something happened, I go, this would be the one situation.
I didn't escalate anything.
You know, I wasn't going to stare him down, like put the knife away or say
anything stupid to him, I wasn't going to do anything, but that was the one time
I could have told you, I said, I would have felt a lot more comfortable
if I had something with me.
Yeah.
And we, we talk about that kind of stuff in class too, cause you know, third
party incidents like that are, you know, getting involved in that.
There's a million ways that can go sideways, you know, whether that woman
was a hostage or not, and that's, that's a big deal on that.
One of the reasons for the next steps class is because, you know, I see a lot
of people in the CCW qual class that we teach that, okay, they're the only,
they're getting this concealed carry license and they're the only ones
they know that carry.
So it's like, well, who do you, who do they talk to, to find out about
holsters, about gun belts, about carrying with around in the chamber,
dealing with colleagues and family and friends, getting involved in third
party incidents, cause you know, we don't generally in the qualification
class, we touch on that stuff, we don't really hit it hard cause we're
only there for a day.
So, you know, that was one of the reasons I developed the next steps
class to talk about those things.
But, you know, when you see something like that, you know, what's running
through your mind, especially if you're carrying is okay, do I get involved?
Do I help this woman?
You know, what you got to think about that stuff ahead of time.
There's, there's an instructor that says your, your mind, what's it say?
Your body cannot go where your mind hasn't been.
What they're talking about there is, you know, if you haven't thought about
this kind of stuff ahead of time, you're less likely to make the good decision
or the correct decision under stress like that in a few seconds that you
have to decide.
So, you know, thinking about that kind of stuff is really important.
And, um, like we're saying, you win every fight you avoid.
So, you know, if you can avoid that kind of stuff, that's the way to go.
That is an excellent point.
And, and it actually mirrors an upcoming show, a conversation, a
pre-production conversation I had with another guest in the future who teaches
from the perspective of you have to think through, not just the reaction,
but the planned action and the difference between those, of course, is that if,
you know, anything you do, particularly, I mean, Ken's talking about on the
trolley, anything that goes down the trolley, it's going to be on a security
camera, it's probably going to be on three or four other people's iPhones,
you know, or, or whatever phone they're carrying.
And it's going to be uploaded to Instagram and TikTok and things like that.
And that's going to be used against you.
And if you overreact, you know, disproportionate, you talked about Ken,
you know, the fact that some of these people have mental challenges.
You just took out a guy who is known to have mental problems.
And now his family's sitting in court, aggrieved over the fact that, you know,
you didn't read something that to them was obvious.
That was just a body language thing, correctly.
Yeah, that that's where the danger, but, you know, Joe, you said something.
And for those who don't know on the San Diego County Gunners Association website,
Joe recently posted an article.
It's a quick read, but, but worth reading.
I recommend it to people, but you were talking about your students and you said,
they know that very few of the problems are gun problems as you already related.
And I want to question that for a second.
Do you think that most, maybe your students are a little higher caliber, not to make
a pun, but do you think that most people understand that especially, and I'm not
being critical, but do you think that that's the case in constitutional carry states
where now people with no training at all are sticking a gun in their waist belt and
saying, you know what, I'm the man now and kind of like, I am the law and I'm going to go out and be the enforcer or the vigilante or I'm going to be the gunman.
I'm going to take care of business.
And they really haven't thought about the consequences.
Yeah.
And our students understand that because Bill and I make it a point to tell them
that, but no, you're right with the constitutional carry states.
That was one of my reservations I had about that.
I mean, you know, I completely support constitutional carry.
It's your right to carry, but I was hesitant about that just for exactly that reason.
Because okay, people decide they're going to, they're going to carry a gun.
And if they're not required to go to any kind of training, how do you, how did they know, you know, how to stay out of trouble?
Basically what they can do, what they can't do.
Cause the laws, you know, laws are, especially in California, but I mean, laws anywhere are not particularly rational.
They're not logical.
They're not something that you would think, okay, that makes sense.
A lot of times they're not like that at all.
And, you know, I voiced that concern.
We were doing the radio show one day and we had, we had Ursula Williams, who's a,
who's a competitive shooter from Arizona.
And then Chris Chang, who was the, one of the top gun winners, they were the guests in the show.
And I was mentioning that constitutional carry came up and, you know, I was mentioning that I had that kind of reservation as a, as a trainer, an instructor.
You know, that people that just decide they're going to carry, you know, that's, you know, something that made me nervous that they're not prepared necessarily.
It was interesting because Ursula and Chris both jumped on me for that.
And they said, you know, it's not your responsibility.
They're saying these are adults, these are responsible adults.
They're, they're making the decision to carry a firearm.
It's on them to learn the things that they need to learn to do this responsibly.
And, you know, I was thinking about, and I thought, yeah, you know, you're right.
And I actually feel that way.
I just didn't know I felt that way because like in our classes, you know, if we have, you know, typically we'll have say 18 people or so in a class for the
concealed carry qual and, and I know just looking at the class, I know half of those people, at least won't set foot in another classroom, you know, and for another two years until they have to come back and recall, you know, and I can't make people be responsible.
I used to feel bad about that.
And, but that, that discussion with Ursula and Chris kind of straighten me out on that one.
Cause again, I can do what I can do.
That's why I created these, the two classes, the pepper spray and situational awareness class.
And the next steps class, just, okay.
I'm offering, I'm offering the, the knowledge here, I guess, if it's up to you, if you want to take me up on the offer, you know, I'm offering to give you the stuff you need to do this hopefully safely and effectively.
And if you ever do get into a situation, you know, hopefully you'll respond correctly and you won't get yourself in more trouble, but you know, you can't, you can't make people be responsible.
You can't legislate that kind of stuff.
So that's kind of how I looked at it with the constitutional carry.
You know much about how the, um, the laws on pepper spray has changed over the years.
The reason I say this is, uh, I was, Craig and I were talking about this.
It was like, it must've been about 40 years ago, Craig.
It was back in the early eighties that you and I went over to Mesa college.
I think it was, and we took a class on pepper spray or whatever it was, OC, whatever, all caps again, whatever.
At the time, um, and, and they gave us a card.
It was a lifetime, uh, card that was, uh, I still have it around here someplace.
It's like 40 years.
I used to carry it in my wallet, uh, back when I, when I had that.
And, uh, you know, I don't even know if they even require that anymore.
I was just curious.
Yeah.
Tell us about that, Joe.
I mean, and to not just California, but can you speak to other states and municipalities?
Yeah.
You know, I could speak to, there's several states that have a lot of
personal experience with obviously California and, you know, some of the worst ones really don't
regulate it that much.
Like out here in California, you know, anyone that's, um, 18 and older can buy pepper spray and carry
pepper spray, um, 16 to 18 with parental permission.
There's no license or anything like that required.
Um, it is considered use of force.
So if you use, if you spray someone and you're not justified, you can be fined, you can be
jailed for that as a felony or a misdemeanor.
Um, I believe, well, it depends on what you're doing with it.
I believe it's a misdemeanor for the most part, um, because you can spend it's up to a
thousand dollar fine and I think a year in county jail.
And, um, I want to, I just had it up here too.
I dropped it.
Um, well, your article, just as a reminder, your article mentioned that you said imprisonment
up to three years or one year in county jail.
Three years to me sounds like that sounds like a felony.
Yeah. And it could be, I did not see that when I looked at the, um, when I looked at
the law on there, when I was reading the penal code and I'm not sure exactly how that,
that may be the prosecutor's discretion as to how they charge that.
And it may depend on what you're doing, because, um, one of the things that's going on
now is criminals are using pepper spray.
And, uh, so they're using pepper spray to rob people.
So, um, you know, if you use it in the commission of another crime like that, it's
an accelerator. Yeah. That's probably where they can, I, you know, I'm guessing they have
the discretion, but I can't say for sure.
Um, but even the, um, other places, like I grew up in New Jersey, so I was just back
there a couple of weeks ago, visiting my mom.
You know, I looked up the, uh, the pepper spray thing there and you can carry pepper
spray in New Jersey, which again, that's one of the more abusive States when it comes to
your rights.
Um, even New York, um, you have to buy the pepper spray, I think through an FFL.
In New York and they, they kind of license it that way, but even there, you can carry
pepper spray.
So I'm guessing most States are, are not real, um, real restrictive on that.
Cause those, those three States are some of the worst States in the country.
Yeah.
So if that's the extent in those States, it's probably not, not much worse any place
else.
So let me stick in a PSA here for the listeners misuse of pepper spray.
If you are in a state that issues pepper spray, you're not going to be able to
use CCWs that you, that's not constitutional carry.
Uh, those are adjudicated based on among other things, criminal records and your
character and things like that.
Uh, if you end up misusing pepper spray, whether in a misdemeanor offense or
particularly a felony offense, you've probably just lost your access to your CCW
as well, because at least it won't be renewed.
So something to consider.
Yeah, that's it's actually worse than that because you have to, and something
we tell all of our students, if you're carrying concealed and you get involved
in some other altercation and it turns into an assault thing, even if you get
into say just a fight where you just throw them punches, for instance, if that
happens while you are armed, even though the gun had nothing to do with it, you
can be charged at a higher level for, um, for doing something when you're carrying.
Um, my teaching partner, uh, tells a story of, uh, I think the guy was, um,
um, a friend, somebody who knew it was his son.
And this was back in Virginia.
The guy got, got involved with a bad woman and, uh, the woman invited, uh, this
guy and her current boyfriend over at the same time to see what she could instigate.
And it turned into some shoving and pushing around and stuff like that.
And the one guy pulled out a little canister of pepper spray, sprayed
the other guy and then left after a day or two, being a good guy.
He went in and turned himself into the police saying, yeah, I did spray him.
And during the course of talking to the police, you know, he said he was a
concealed carrier carrier he was carrying, but he didn't do anything with
the gun or anything like that.
And the charge went from a simple assault and there was some mandatory
sentencing thing back there, um, at the time, and because he did it with a gun,
uh, he was sentenced to five years in prison for committing that assault while
armed.
So like we tell our students, that's why you have to avoid all of that stuff.
You don't want to get involved in anything at all.
If you're a concealed carrier, you gotta, you gotta conduct yourself at a higher
level than other people do.
Um, because, and again, anything you get involved with while you're carrying,
whether the gun has anything to do with it or not, can get you in more trouble,
more serious trouble.
What's your opinion now we've been talking pepper spray, pepper spray, pepper
spray.
I'm going to ask a two part question.
Other non-lethal or less lethal options that you think are valid and if not why,
and other chemistries of, um, let's say sprays, not because there's not a
better spray or well, but their spray is, I think it's just a concentrated
thing in a big can and the cans too big to carry in public cause it's over two
and a half ounces.
I think that's the preclusion on bear spray, but I'm thinking like OCOS, some
of the older formulas and things like that.
I, I, if you can address that, I think the market maybe is all now pepper spray
anyway, I'm not sure.
Yeah.
And the pepper spray is technically OC spray.
I mean, that's what that is.
Um, the law in California, they talk about, they talk about mace and other,
other chemicals, uh, sprays, but generally what most people have is pepper spray.
In terms of non-lethal stuff, you know, the other basic, the basic stuff is
non-lethal stuff, you know, the other big one you probably see are the electronic
control devices or tasers, that kind of stuff.
And you know, there's, there's the two kinds there.
There's the kind that actually have the prongs that you have to touch somebody
with, and then there's the, the taser style.
And I think taser is a company.
It's a brand name.
Yes, it is.
Yeah.
The style where it shoots the two prongs out basically.
Right.
And the problem with those, you know, for the one, if, if it's the shocker
to get close enough to touch somebody, I mean, it'll work, but you got to get
close enough, you got to get within arm's reach of the person to do that,
which is not a good thing.
One of the good things pepper spray gives you is distance.
Um, you can deploy the pepper spray probably from 10 feet out reasonably.
And that gives you a little bit of distance between you and the attacker.
Um, the other thing about tasers is they say they work really well if you get
two good hits with those two prongs, you got to get two good hits, it's got to go
through the clothing, you can't miss with one prong.
If you notice, um, if you watch videos, if you watch John Korea's videos or any
of those crime type videos, when with police, when they deploy a taser, there's
always, always another officer back there with, with a gun as a backup.
Because again, you know, it depends on, on getting those prongs in a good spot.
If you get them in there, they work great.
Um, which again, with pepper spray too, something we tell people with pepper
spray is it works most of the time, you know, probably over 90% of the time.
But there are people out there that it doesn't bother, you know, and that's,
you know, that's one thing to consider.
I remember, um, years ago, I bartended for a long time at the old town Mexican
cafe and, um, there was a guy in there one day and back then I was gardening a lot.
And I'd grown a bunch of these, um, habanero peppers and one of the managers
said, Hey, why don't you bring those, bring me some in, I'll grind them up,
you know, dry them out and grind them up for you, make a powder.
So I said, okay, great.
So I had a big bag of these habanero peppers on the back bar and there was a
guy sitting at the bar and he said, Hey, are those habaneros?
I said, yeah.
And he said, um, Hey, can I have one or two?
I said, sure.
If they're really hot, he said, no, it don't bother me at all.
And he grabbed one.
I gave him a couple.
He grabbed me, just popped it in his mouth, like a cherry and just chewed it up.
It was great.
So down the other end of the bar is one of my regular customers and he's looking,
Hey, give me some of those.
And he had a couple of beers by then.
And I said, Hey, give me a couple of those things.
And I said, dude, I don't know what that was.
It just happened, but that is not normal.
You don't really want to do this.
Yeah.
Give me one.
All right.
Here you go.
So I gave him one and he threw it in his mouth, started chewing it up and his,
his face just turned bright red.
His eyes were just streaming water.
He knocked out two beers and a glass of half and half that I gave him.
And you know, the point there is there are some people that
that just doesn't bother.
The other thing with the pepper spray is too, you got, you got to hit them.
And that's why we tell people, you know, if you're going to deploy it, you
don't want to like hold the spray out and say, you know, don't come near me.
I'll spray you.
Cause now you're telling the guy that you got it.
And we'll do this in class with the inert sprayers.
And if somebody knows you have it and they're trying not to be sprayed,
it's hard to hit them sometimes.
So, you know, if you're going to deploy that it comes out fast and you deploy it.
And, and you spray them because again, if they know they could duck their head
down, they can do different things.
And you got to remember with the pepper spray, unlike a taser, you know, if you
get a good hit with a taser that the person's done, they're not going to be
doing anything for a little bit with the pepper spray, even if you get a good
solid hit to the eyes, if they get their hands on you, they can do anything after
their spray that they could have done to you before they were sprayed.
They just can't have their eyes open when they're doing it.
So, you know, you have to consider that kind of stuff, um, you know, when you're
using this, that's a good point.
I got a question about, uh, are you aware of any dogs or other animals that,
because I figured the only time I would probably use the pepper spray if I'm
driving along and for example, I see a kid being attacked by a vicious dog or
something like that.
Have you ever heard of a certain types of dogs or certain types of other animals
that are just not affected by pepper spray?
No, it should work great on all kinds of dogs, coyotes, animals like that.
And that's a great, that's another good reason to carry it.
Um, because again, we'll talk about like in my neighborhood here, I'm out in
Lakeside and there's lots of people walking lots of dogs out here all the time.
There's also some neighbors that have some big goofy dogs that get out on
their own sometimes, you know, if you get a dog like that, like I've got smaller
dog, I've got pugs here.
You know, if you have a bigger dog attacking your dog, you really, you know,
a gun's not something that's appropriate there.
You can't really use that.
If you have a dog attacking you or a child, I mean, in that case, the gun would
be appropriate, but you got to think about that if, um, you know, if you've
got, say you're walking a, you know, a little kid with you or something like
that, and the dog comes up and attacks the kid first off, can you hit, do you
train, do you practice to hit a, a small snarling snapping target that's moving
all over the place when it's like right next to a child or you, the other thing
is you're discharging a firearm, you know, in the community, in a neighborhood,
which is not going to be a good thing.
Pepper spray is perfect in that kind of situation.
Um, so, you know, it works really well with, um, with animals and things like
that, so that's another good reason, I guess, to carry something like that.
You mentioned then going to the idea that you have, uh, a child in proximity.
Um, perhaps you're in a crowded bar that you already kind of alluded to.
Um, and you know, as, as I think you put it, this, um, what was the term
you used, you had an acronym for it, uh, the general, what was he called?
Oh, and the article, the GVA, the GVA, the GVA, the, the, and, and
garden variety, uh, a hole.
There you go.
Yeah.
So you have your GVA or two GVAs who, who've decided that, you know, they
don't like the fact that you're looking at this girl who happens to be attractive
and you're doing that anyway, because whatever, but there's also 10 other
people around who are going to get hit by the cloud.
Well, it depends on the, the pepper spray that I carry is a stream type pepper
spray, um, which is what you really want to carry, um, uh, clad and you can carry.
The only thing that, uh, California says you cannot carry is, uh, something
that's a, that shoots projectiles.
So, you know, they, they make things that shoot pepper balls.
Yeah.
Um, so that California says you can have that, but gels, clouds, sprays, um,
they're all fine with in California.
Um, but that's the idea with the spray, I think, is it's more direct or
it's more precise, I guess your chances of, um, hitting people around, you
know, collateral damage, uh, are a lot lower, but, um, you know, hey, if you
shoot a, you know, if you have a spray type and you, uh, shoot a cloud out there,
as long as you get the guy that you needed to get, uh, you know, you can
get the guy that you needed to get.
I guess that's okay.
Okay.
Now you've subdued, you know, these perps who are now behaving as if they're, you
know, in pain because they are, and, and the threat is passed.
I'm assuming that the general advice is you do just like you would in a shooting.
You call the police, you're the first one to call the police.
They show up and then you're going to articulate what happened to them.
Yeah.
And that's what I would say, because again, if, especially if you're in a
place like that where there's lots of people around, you're for sure going to
get videoed, um, there's going to be other people there and you don't know
what other people are going to say.
And it's, it's unfortunate in our society, but people say all sorts of things now.
So if you do have to do something like that, again, it is a use of force.
It's not deadly force, but you did use force.
So probably better for you to call the police, um, get on record that you, okay,
you made the call if they do show up, if they do bother to come out there,
something that we tell students or that I tell students all the time is a CYA
is a, the thing you want to remember.
And, um, you know, what CYA is, is can you articulate?
So can you explain why what you did was reasonable for a person in your
situation, knowing what you knew at the time.
And that's what we say, even if you have to use a firearm, that's, you
have to be able to explain that because the, um, you know, the laws, like with
firearms, they're not black and white, it's a big gray area because, you know,
you responded to say a deadly threat.
So what, what's a threat of great bodily injury or death?
And it depends something, you know, for an older person, like if you have a
younger, say a younger person throwing punches, uh, you know, you have a
25 year old guy throwing a punch at a 70 year old man, you could probably make
a good argument that that was a threat of great bodily injury.
Um, you know, a 25 year old throwing a punch at another 25 year old, you're
going to have a harder time making that argument.
You know, if you have two or three attackers, you can make a disparity
of force argument.
So, you know, it's not a gray area.
So CYA is what you want to remember.
You know, can you articulate why what you did was reasonable for someone in
your situation, knowing what you knew at the time.
How do you think you should carry?
I mean, do you make your own custom holster with another little pocket in
it or, you know, do you throw it in the pocket with your keys or what do
you, what do you recommend for that?
Because there's an awful lot of, there's a big, big, big industry for firearm
holsters and I think not much for any non-lethal options.
Yeah.
And I haven't looked, uh, cause I saw that and, um, when we were talking
about questions, what we might talk about today, um, you know, holsters
with another, you know, a spot for pepper spray, and I have not looked for those.
It would not surprise me if they're out there and people make everything now.
Um, for me personally, I would not carry the pepper spray near the
firearm just because, okay, if you've got to deploy, say you got to get the
pepper spray out, if it's in a compartment or a something that's attached to this,
you know, the holster where your gun is, you're, you know, and you're carrying
concealed, you're probably going to have to reveal your gun to get to the pepper
spray if it's in the same holster.
So what I do, um, and the two pepper sprays I like, I like Palm pepper spray,
which is what I carry.
The other one that's really good is a Sabre brand, both Palm and Sabre are really good.
And, um, they both make, uh, the same kinds of clips or devices on them to carry.
Palm, the one I carry with Palm has a little clip that clips into your pocket.
So like I carry my firearm on my right side, I keep the pepper spray in my
pocket on my left side, and it clips in.
And what I like about it is I could reach in there and I could orient that in my
hand so that if I can feel the clip against my fingers, I know it's pointed in
the right direction.
I don't have to look at it.
And so I like that about the Palm.
Um, the other version they have is the key chain version, which again is another
good way to do it.
Um, you know, if you're walking out to your car or something like that, you
should have your keys out.
So it's a real handy thing to carry, just hold the pepper spray on your keys.
And then that way it's in your hand already.
Nobody's thinking you have anything other than keys, um, in your hand.
So that's a good way to do it.
So for me personally, I don't think I would carry it with the holster just
because if I have to get to it, I pretty much have to move my shirt out of the
way or do something that's likely to reveal my gun or my holster.
So I probably wouldn't do it that way.
Are there, um, situations that you have seen where either by law or just by
wisdom, you think it's a bad idea to carry pepper spray?
Um, that you would recommend against it for some reason?
Um, for carrying, uh, I, I would not, I mean, some, and if someplace where it's
probably not legal, like I would not carry it onto an airplane, that's going
to get you trouble going through TSA or something like that.
Um, other than that, there really isn't any, I don't know that I could think of
any place where I would say not carry it.
There are times when it's not appropriate.
Obviously it's not, it's not an appropriate response to a deadly threat.
If you're being threatened by someone with an edged weapon of some sort or a gun,
it's not an appropriate response to that.
But in terms of carrying it, you know, as long as you're not someplace where
you're prohibited by law from carrying it, um, I don't know that I would think,
I can think of any place where you wouldn't want to carry it.
And is bear spray a cloud version of basically the same a chemical?
It is.
Um, and again, the thing with bear spray, it's, it gets, it gets back to that
CYA thing, if you have to deploy it, you know, what you're going to be asked is
why are you carrying this, this beer can size thing of bear spray around with you
in public?
It's like, you'll hear people talk about wasps, right?
I hear this in class all the time.
You know, wow, you could use wasps spray.
So yeah, you could, but you're going to have to explain why you did that and why
you possibly cause somebody some permanent eye damage and why you were
carrying that thing around.
Yeah, if you're attacked in your garden shed and that was the first thing you
grabbed, okay, you can probably explain that away, but if you're downtown going
to a restaurant and you're carrying a can of wasps spray, you're probably going
to have a problem with it.
So same thing with bear spray.
I mean, bear spray, you can walk into Turner's now and buy bear spray and it's
much bigger than the what, two and a half ounces that we're supposed to be limited
to for, for pepper spray to carry.
But again, so there is a maximum limit of like two and a half ounces.
You say, yeah, in California, they say two and a half ounces is what it's supposed
to be.
Is that on your physical person?
What, what if you have something tucked in your car door in your car, for example?
Again, you could probably, uh, again, it's, it gets to be a CYA thing.
You know, why were you, why is it there?
Why were you carrying it?
Um, they just say using pepper spray is a defensive tool against other people.
California says two and a half ounces.
All this stuff is up for debate and know your laws and whatever jurisdiction you
have in your hands.
Who knows it might be three ounces someplace else and one ounce someplace.
Oh, you never know.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
The more you, you kind of go, the more you kind of bend those laws, the more
challenging you make it for your legal team.
If it goes that far for them to argue it.
Have you seen that the laws either in California that you can speak to
specifically, or just generally across the country are becoming more permissive
in terms of, of pepper spray and other non-lethal options, more restrictive?
About the same?
Um, no, I have, I have really not seen all the stuff that I, you know, get to look
at through the gun owners and writing and all this stuff.
I really have not seen much on that stuff.
I don't think many of the States are doing too much with that.
Again, you know, I would look at where you're likely to see that kind of
stuff is the most restrictive States.
So just looking at California, New Jersey and New York, they don't seem to be
doing much more in terms of going further to restrict that kind of stuff.
So my guess would be most places probably are not, but I mean, I couldn't, you know,
I've never done an exhaustive search for that to see what was going on.
Okay.
I got a question for you.
Another good thing to have with you and non-lethal is a flashlight,
a nice bright flashlight.
Particularly a lot of stuff happens at night and the flashlight can be a
wonderful way to keep you and that and a loud voice, a commanding voice can
get you out of a lot of situations.
Okay.
Since we're frugal firearms, we're going to start with the person who has
their first $30 to spend.
Would you spend that first $30 on a good flashlight or would you spend that first
$30 on a can of a pepper spray?
Oh, I'd spend it on the pepper spray.
Cause you can get a couple of cans.
Uh, you can get two cans of spray for 30 bucks and you're not going to get a
good flashlight, probably for 30.
Yeah, that's probably true.
Okay.
So that's good.
But a flashlight though, you brought up a good point though.
Flashlight is something you should always be carrying, especially if you're
carrying a firearm, because again, you have to see, you can't shoot at something
you can't for sure identify.
Um, you know, and if you're in a, uh, you know, a low light kind of condition,
you can't just shoot at a shadow.
So you, you, you have to have a flashlight and, um, I carry a nice small
one actually, that's a, that's really bright, uh, by Olight.
And, um, you know, there was a place, my wife is a retired educator.
She was a retired principal.
And, um, back when she was teaching, um, there's a restaurant in El Cajon.
I think it's Corfavor, I think it's called, but it was real popular for
birthday parties and retirements and things.
So I found myself there a couple of times.
And if you're familiar with that area, that main street of El Cajon or the
restaurant is there's a side street just behind it where everybody tends the park.
And, um, if you get there when it's light, it's a nice little street.
If you come out of the restaurant after it's dark, the street is pitch black.
There's not a light anywhere on it.
And, um, the first time I parked on there and made that mistake, I said,
Oh, this isn't good because you're, you're walking down this pitch black street.
I think there's actually an empty lot where people hang out on one side of it.
But a simple flashlight, you know, could help you avoid problems in places
like that, if you're silly enough to park on a street like that.
Um, just by having the flashlight out, cause people looking at it, they don't
know if you're a cop, they don't know what that is with that flashlight.
The other thing is if you just have the flashlight in your hand, like you were
saying, you can get a really bright little flashlight nowadays.
The one I carry is very bright and flashing somebody in the face in the dark
like that is enough, you know, to, uh, probably enable you to break contact and
get away if you're in a situation like that.
So flashlight's a great thing to carry.
Everybody should carry those.
Interrupts their OODA loop and we can talk OODA loop some other time, but that's a,
you know, that actually we discussed that during episode three, that's a,
that's a very important thing because they don't expect that.
In fact, I think to your point, you know, if you really kind of want to go
gear-ish on this, I think that Olight actually makes a combination, uh,
flashlight and OC spray holder.
I think I've seen that.
So you could kind of, you know, you think about a way to get that
kind of, you know, you think about a weapon light, right?
So now you have your, your pepper spray mounted light as well.
Yeah, no, and they probably do have, they just have to make sure you're,
you know, which button you're pushing when.
That's an excellent point.
I've actually made that mistake too.
Cause I carry the flashlight in the same pocket where the pepper spray is.
It's just the pepper spray is clipped and the flashlight is loose.
There was a night in my truck where I reached in there and looking for the
flashlight and my hand came out with the pepper spray that I was pushing, trying
to, uh, trying to light something up.
And how much pain were you in after that?
So that was good.
Fortunately, Tom, the other thing I like about Tom is there is a cover on the
button, so you actually have to slip your thumb up underneath to push this
cover up to push it.
Yeah.
And again, that's not foolproof either.
Um, I had come home one day from, um, from the range and I think when I was
shooting, I just, I took the pepper spray out and I threw it in the car.
So when I was coming in that night, I just, I picked the pepper spray,
the flashlight up, the keys.
I threw it all in my pocket and I came in the door and we have, I was
telling you I had pugs and we've got a little gate by the kitchen doorway.
And I bent over the gate to pet the pugs and I heard this hissing sound,
this, this just like air escaping.
I'm thinking, wow, what is that?
And I stood up and I, and the sound went away and I bent back over to pet the
pugs and I heard it again.
And then I felt crap.
The pepper spray and running out of the house and a key or something had
gotten into the, uh, where the button was and it pushed enough of it.
I don't think any spray actually came out, but the, uh, the propelling came out.
So, uh, you do have to pay attention as to how you carry it.
I guess I wouldn't carry it loose in the pocket.
Yeah.
Because you don't want to incapacitate yourself by virtue of spraying
yourself in the wrong spot, because I don't think a legitimate self defense
against, you know, street crime is to incapacitate them by making them laugh so
hard at you that they can't move.
So that's true.
You got any anecdotal stuff for us?
Any funny stories, things like that, either from class to the real world or
something like that, just as, as we draw to a close here?
Well, let's see.
Um, what did I give you?
I gave you my bartending story.
Um, no, uh, you know, in terms of just, you know, stuff that goes on in
class and things like that, it's, um, you know, not, not any, you know, kind
of funny stories, but just trying to encourage people to, to take the
stuff more seriously and, you know, come up with things cause like, um, you
know, what's nice about the pepper spray is it gives you an alternative and
like, you get some guys in class, you know, they'll talk about, you know,
empty handed skills and things like that.
Okay.
Defending yourself.
And, you know, I used to do martial arts when I was younger and stuff like that.
And, and I was pretty good at it.
And if I failed back then I could also run.
Um, but now as I get older, you know, those options are kind of going away.
You know, people need to be realistic.
I think about what they can do and what they can't do, you know, cause you'll,
you'll hear instructors, well, you could, you could punch the person in the throat.
Okay.
Yeah, I guess you could.
Do you ever practice that?
You know, you look at the average person.
I don't know if you've tried to throw a punch lately, but if it's not
something you do regularly, it's not a normal natural motion.
It feels really weird.
When I was doing martial arts, we threw hundreds of punches each week,
probably more than that.
Um, but now, you know, I did it just a couple of weeks ago, fooling around.
And that's not a, it's not a natural motion at all.
So, you know, I would want people to have realistic views of what they can do.
And, you know, what's, what's likely to work, what's not likely to work,
what's unreasonable, what's reasonable.
And now I wish I could be, I don't have a good, uh, funny
anecdotal story for you though.
Well, then, then you actually touched on something else that was in the show
notes, which is what misconceptions do students come in with when, before
they arrive in class, they're interested in taking the pepper spray class and
they learn something that they never would have thought of.
Yeah.
And probably the biggest thing, I think, in terms of the pepper spray and the
misconceptions is the, the idea that it may not always work and that you do
actually have to hit what you're shooting at, um, because like I said, we
use, uh, in class, you know, I give away a pepper spray to each student and I
also give them a little, a nerd trainer and we'll play around with the trainers
in class for a little bit so they can kind of see, okay, this is about how far
it shoots.
This is okay.
If you're, you know, I'll have them, uh, we get a lot of people like, uh, you
know, it'll be a woman will come in with her boyfriend or husband or something.
And I'll have them kind of shoot at each other and, um, you know, just get an
idea of how that is, cause it's not, you know, if you haven't tried the kind of
stuff, like I said, I want people to be realistic about, okay, what I can do.
Okay.
I've tried this inert sprayer and I know I could reasonably hit somebody at five
feet away or something like that.
So just, you know, having that realistic idea of what you can and can't do.
The other thing I'll do too, since, um, it's not reasonable to spray each
other with real pepper spray.
So what I'll do is, um, I'll show, uh, one of John Korea's videos and then I
show another video of just, of people getting sprayed.
So you say they'd have an idea of, okay, this is what you can expect if you
spray somebody and you hit them.
So it's just, I think the, uh, just the realistic expectations of what's possible.
What's not possible, but you don't do them.
You don't do the Marine Corps thing of, you know, spray yourself so
you can experience this.
Yeah.
I wish, you know, there's, there's insurance reasons and things like that.
So you can't really, uh, you can't really, even the classes I've taken.
I mean, I've taken an instructor class with Chuck Haggard or Haggard, who is,
um, you know, one of the authorities on training and pepper spraying stuff
across the country.
And even in his class, he said, yeah, I'd love to spray you, but, and we can't do
it, it's an insurance thing.
So, uh, so yeah, we can't really spray people, but we can show them videos
of people that got sprayed.
I guess that's as close as we can get.
Yeah.
I mean, sure.
I don't want to be.
Yeah.
All right.
Well, Joe, got anything else for us before we close up?
Um, no, it's about it really.
Um, again, I would, uh, you know, thank you for the, for the, for the
information that you've given us.
And, um, I would, uh, you know, thank you for inviting me on here.
Um, again, I write articles every week on, uh, on Substack at
getagrip.substack.com.
Again, so I would just encourage people to read that stuff.
Cause my, my whole reason for writing these articles and doing this and the
radio show and all that stuff is to just get information out.
The other stuff I do, I do for money, but, uh, this, I mean, I do this for
a little bit of money, but my, uh, my main thing here, especially since I got
the $500,000 in that is just, um, it's more of a, a desire to get information
out to people that want to learn this stuff.
Um, You know, have people take responsibility for their safety and the
safety of their families and their loved ones and then they do it right.
So, you know, you don't get yourself goofed up and, uh, cause
yourself a bigger problem.
Perfect.
Yeah.
All right.
Well, well, thanks for your time.
And, uh, you know, we'll, we'll be seeing you down at gun prom, but I
I guess we did leave one question off the table, which I think is, is worth, you
know, visiting before we close out.
Most people are in our listening audience or not in San Diego.
How do they find a qualified?
What are the metrics that a person would use to find a qualified trainer?
Because anyone can hang a shingle out and say, I train in pepper spray.
I train in CCW.
So on and so forth.
What do you look for?
Yeah.
And I think the best thing nowadays is the old fashioned way is the word of mouth
thing, if you can find somebody that's taken a class with that, because you know,
nowadays with the websites and the web designers and stuff, you can make
something look really great, but you don't know.
And the other thing too, you know, from a student's point of view, unless you're
really, um, a little bit more experienced with this is, you know, you've heard of
the, the unconscious incompetence, right?
You don't know what you don't know.
Oh yeah.
You know, and I would, I would tell people, okay, at least, you know, okay,
look on their website, see what they describe, what, what topics do they hit
in their class?
The problem with that is again, the unconscious incompetence.
If you don't know what you don't know, then you don't know what to look for.
You have no idea of judging that.
Is that real?
Is that reasonable?
Is it not reasonable?
Is it, does it look good?
Um, so I think the best way is if you can find somebody that's taken the class
and there's this, had that instructor for something that that's probably the
most secure way, the best way to find a good instructor, I think I just did
that.
Um, when I was back in New Jersey, um, one of my cousins who she's got like a
40 acre, uh, horse branch and she has big events there and she's gotten out
campgrounds and stuff and she lives by herself and she just bought a gun.
She was telling me she bought a little MMP shield and, but she didn't know how
to use it or how to do anything with it.
She went, I think she went to the range once with a friend.
So I had kind of connected her with somebody back there.
I sent her a couple of the textbooks that I use in my classes.
And then, um, you know, I, I talked to a friend of mine back there and had, uh,
him, he gave me a name of an instructor that he says is fantastic.
That's right in the area.
And, uh, she called the guy now and I guess she's going to take a class with
him in another week or two.
So, I mean, it's the, it's the word of mouth.
If you could talk to somebody that's actually had the instructor, that's
probably the safest way.
Right.
Joe.
Okay.
Uh, Ken, anything else for Joe?
No, that's good.
Joe, I really appreciate your time.
Thank you so much.
And we'll see you at gun prom.
All right.
Well, thank you guys.
I'll look for you at gun prom.
Exactly.
Yeah.
So, uh, today's, uh, talk was very, very informative and very much appreciate it.
And once again, uh, this is Craig's and I, uh, opinion.
We don't play a professional on television or we're not a doctor.
We're not the lawyer.
We're not, this is not legal advice, but it is our, just our personal opinions
when they're hoping you're enjoying listening to it, Craig.
Yeah, that's exactly right.
You know, laws change, municipalities are different.
Uh, people's preferences are different.
What works for you, uh, even coming down to the, how you dress will tell you a
lot about what your everyday carry kit can be, um, what kind of threats you
face or whether you face any threats.
Honestly, the best option, you know, as Joe talked about is just don't be there.
And if you have to be there, try to get out of there.
And if you can't get out of there, then, you know, go to something else that
those are all important lessons that I think that people who just pick up a gun
and shove it in their pants and say, I'm good to go, that they just haven't
thought the problem through completely.
And that's what we're here to fix.
And like I said, we have upcoming shows and an expanding audience.
Who do we have?
Ken, did you know that now we have South Africa listening to it?
And did you know, and Slovenia, something I wouldn't have expected some, some
English speaking person in Slovenia has picked us up too.
So, uh, yeah, the, the, the show's getting traction.
Uh, but, but the way, the best way to get a traction, of course, is to drop a
comment, uh, drop a rating either on the Facebook page or an iTunes or whatever
podcast aggregator you use, uh, please send us comments, questions, things like that.
The next couple of shows are going to be product focused shows that are going to be,
we're not going to tell you who, kind of listen to find out.
Uh, but there's a couple of interesting, uh, companies that we're going to be
discussing, uh, then we'll cycle back into some of the training, um, aspects
of firearms ownership.
We're going to keep this mixed up.
We're going to keep this interesting, but everything is based on what's
that first word, Ken?
Frugal.
Yeah.
Enjoy yourself and save money at the same time.
So thanks for listening everyone and good night.