3-on-1 street fight/mugging as told by the 1.

[HanshiClayton]

I'm going to be a little careful here by not explicitly identifying the writer, but he reads these pages and he will see your comments. In fact, he has asked for your comments. Picture a male in his 40s with some background in karate and jujutsu, but not a shodan yet.

Here's his story of an experience he had about a week ago, near Christmas of 2011. The location is a suburb of New York City. The assailants appeared to be Hispanic or Latin American. BDC

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It was just about midnight Sunday passed, where my girlfriend and I were doing "drive-by's" at potential homes to purchase. We had turned north off Jericho Turnpike, a fairly busy throughway when three guys were crossing the street. Two of them went ahead, and one of them had waited at the divider who waved us on. I had held up my hand as a thanks and proceeded. Almost immediately, I heard "Bam", something had hit my ford escape.

I backed up, got out and went behind my car and the three were waiting. They were standing in a loose semi-circle, two close to each other, one a few steps away. From left to right I will call them "1", "2", and "3".

1 started peeling off his jacket muttering something like "you want some", as he seemed to be stepping forward. He is standing to my left, 2, slightly to my right and 3, a few steps away, again to my right.

Realizing this was going down, I quickly kicked 1 in the stomach. It was a front kick using my right foot. As I kicked 1, 2, almost simultaneously strikes my right temple with his fist. 1 takes the kick well, and moves more to my left. As I'm slightly disoriented, and 1 seemed to be the lead aggressor, I turned my body left as well, following his movement from the sidewalk into the street. I am now surrounded as 1 is in my front, 2 is to my rear right, and 3 is to my rear left.

1 continued his advance forward, and to the best of my recollection, it was like a charge offering no real openings. I was able to get off a right elbow or forearm which hit is forehead as that too was pointing down. 2 simultaneously began hitting me from the right, and now my right began to block that. My right arm did like a windmill type motion, blocking and I went to a loose headlock. At this point, I am defending with my left, and right, I'm backing up slightly, and I trip on the curb behind me.

I go down on my back, with 1 almost on top of me, and 2 just off to the right in a loose headlock. 3 starts kicking me in the head, striking my left temple, and rear of me head. I'm feeling pain now as 2, was also striking my right side. As I'm still defending 1, I felt his face and began sticking my left index finger into his right eye. He screams out in pain, and 2 reacts by scratching at my face around my right eye. I turn me head ever so slightly, to the right, to face 2, and I see an open mouth descending on my face. I instinctively turn left and 2 proceeds to bite my right cheekbone. 3, is punching my head and I'm feeling like I'm about to blackout. The pain of the bite scared me and provided a rush to survive, I was trying to get up, and forcefully thrusted my left index finger two knuckles deep into 1's eye, and was able to get my right thumb into the eys of 2, who was still biting me.

My girlfriend was in the car witnessing this and was traumatized by the moment. Cars had also begun to turn the corner, and she told me they began honking horns and yelling and such.

They got up, I got up, staggered,....I was almost in blackout, and got back to my car. I drove away and I don't know what happened to the three after that.

This all occurred within a minute or so; and as it turns out, it was a fight for survival, not contest.

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I'm also going to post his self-analysis of lessons learned from this experience. I'll but that in the following message. BDC

[HanshiClayton]

This is the second part of the posting, in which the writer analyzes the lessons he learned from the fight. He has actively requested our insights. BDC

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I took no strikes to the genitals, ribs, or anything else. One shot landed in the upper abdominals, as I can feel it now. In some way it was amateur night, and in some ways these guys had been here before. My first obvious mistake was to get out, my second, was allowing myself to get surrounded. That is obvious. What strikes me most is the simultaneous attacks and the savagery of the biter.

I'm well versed in first aid, and took care of myself well. I'm going to call the doctor, and have him do blood tests.

I'm reaching out this way to you and others, because of some issues that should be addressed by teachers like you and students like myself, and would like your feedback and insight as well.

1., Simultaneous attacks that are so vicious. I say that because the only "multiples" I've seen in any class were quite clean compared to what occurred.

2. The unexpected,....tripping over the curb changed everything. Also the bite on the face. I had been bitten in the past, but it was on the forearm and hands.

3., the effectiveness of the vital strikes,( we used to call it dirty street fighting in the old days) and the degree to which an attacker can take some pain. Even though #1 had a finger in his eye, (and I know it because of the scream and the wetness on my finger) he did not get off. #2., also took a thumb, maybe to the first knuckle. And I'm really not sure if it was the honking cars or the combination of both that made them get up.

4. While on my back, I had no leverage or power. At one point, I had a grip on someone's esophagus, probably #2, and he pulled out of the grip. The eyes were like a last resort.

5. Had, I been thinking survival from the outset, which I wasn't, I may have gone for a genital kick from the beginning as opposed to the front kick to the belly.

6. I was distracted by my feelings for my girlfriend and the possibility of them busting up my car.

There may be other things to consider as well, but I'm still processing the totality of it all.

One last note. I'm 5'10, just about 200 pounds and 46 years old. I've had my share of fights prior to my formalized martial arts training. And I would say those three guys were about my size, maybe slightly smaller.

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So what do you guys think? I'm going to hang back and get your ideas before sharing some more material that my class contributed after hearing this story. BDC

[HanshiClayton]

There was one more message from this writer. Why did he get out of the car? BDC

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My motivation for getting out in the first place; this is a bit elusive. On some level my ego got the better of me. I "wasn't" going to allow myself to be attacked with my Gf in the car. Also there was some desire to put "my money where my mouth was". Additionally, it had been a long time and I just wanted to throw down. Then, there comes the idea that "who the hell were they" to make a victim out of an innocent. This is something that will take some time to sort out. If you want to post to the website, feel free, as I would also learn from the others from a tactical standpoint.

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[SHOJIKISHO]

Our brother, in the martial arts, negleted to observe Fuankoshi's 16 precept in the
NIJU KUN:
" When you travel about, think that you have opponets waiting to catch off-guard."

He not only jepodized his well being, but the well being of his lady friend.

He probably sucummbed to his ego.

Here are some heads-up to the schemes the low-life have, in preying on
innocent people:

While driving on a rural end of the roadway on Thursday morning, I saw an
infant car seat on the side of the road with a blanket draped over it.
For whatever reason, I did not stop, even though I had all kinds of
thoughts running through my head. But when I got to my destination, I
called the PD and they were going to check it out. But, this is
what the Police advised even before they went out there to check....
"There are several things to be aware of ...gangs and thieves are
now plotting different ways to get a person (mostly women) to stop their
vehicle and get out of the car.
"There is a gang initiation reported by the local Police Department
there gangs are placing a car seat by the road...with a fake baby in
it....waiting for a woman, of course, to stop and check on the abandoned
baby.
"Note that the location of this car seat is usually beside a wooded
or grassy (field) area and the person -- woman -- will be dragged into the
woods, beaten and raped, and usually left for dead. If it's a man, they're
usually beaten and robbed and maybe left for dead, too.

DO NOT STOP FOR ANY REASON!!! DIAL 9-1-1 AND REPORT WHAT YOU SAW,
BUT DON 'T EVEN SLOW DOWN.

"IF YOU ARE DRIVING AT NIGHT AND EGGS ARE THROWN AT YOUR WINDSHIELD,
OR YOU HEAR A BANG ON YOUR VEHICLE AS YOU ARE PASSING A GROUP;
DO NOT STOP TO CHECK THE CAR,
DO NOT OPERATE THE WIPER AND
DO NOT SPRAY ANY WATER BECAUSE EGGS MIXED WITH WATER BECOME MILKY AND
BLOCK YOUR VISION UP TO 92.5%, AND YOU ARE THEN FORCED TO STOP BESIDE
THE ROAD AND BECOME A VICTIM OF THESE CRIMINALS.

THIS ARE NEW TECHNIQUES USED BY GANGS, SO PLEASE INFORM YOUR FRIENDS AND
RELATIVES.
THESE ARE DESPERATE TIMES AND THESE ARE UNSAVORY INDIVIDUALS WHO WILL TAKE
DESPERATE MEASURES TO GET WHAT THEY WANT."

[HanshiClayton]

I'm going to respond to this topic by making many small posts. You guys can comment back in the same way.

The location is a suburb of New York City.

I took this story to my class Wednesday night, and we read through it a line at a time. I told them to raise their hands when they heard something that "sounded like a bad idea."

"This incident happened to someone living in New York City," I began. A forest of hands shot up.

My class is in Mariposa, CA, just outside Yosemite National Park, and the adults in the class had all made life decisions to leave the city and raise their families in a more pastoral setting. This creates a certain cultural bias about people who tolerate urban living conditions.

In the Sierra foothills we generally don't have this kind of experience. People pretty much don't get attacked on the street here. We have not had an ATM robbery, ever. Teachers don't get beat up in their classrooms. Doors aren't locked. Cars aren't locked. You can recognize the gang members because they are standing by the side of the road with their hands behind their heads.

We do have other challenges, of course. Kamikaze deer jump in front of our cars. Raccoons eat our cat food. We deal with the odd rattlesnake, mountain lion or bear. Our big hazard is forest fires, but we have lots of time to prepare for them.

This is a small community where over 600 people have permits to carry concealed pistols, and we can only guess at the number who don't bother with the paperwork. There is next to zero violence here, other than the domestic-abuse events that you get everywhere.

You've heard that communities like this one are full of vicious inbred rednecks who kidnap hikers and force them to drink moonshine. We spread those rumors deliberately.

So our first recommendation to anyone raising children in the city is: Find a job in the country and move. It is better to live where there are more trees than cars.

(I had to get that off my chest.)

[HanshiClayton]

The assailants appeared to be Hispanic or Latin American.

I doubt that any of us ascribe much significance to the nationality of the attackers, except to note these points:

• Any group of young men, all of the same ethnic/racial type, with no women, should make us cautious.
  
• If you are not of the same background as the group of young men, be more cautious.
  
• If it's their neighborhood and you are an interloper, be very cautious.

These are just reasons to be alert, not prejudices. If I were to avoid all the Hispanic faces I see, I could never go to another karate practice. (The San Ten organization is the only place I know where you can learn Japanese with a Spanish accent.)

[HanshiClayton]

It was just about midnight Sunday passed, where my girlfriend and I were doing "drive-by's" at potential homes to purchase.

The Mariposans all thought that midnight was a good time to be home in bed, and shook their heads in wonder that anyone would go house-hunting at The Witching Hour. That's when the trolls come out. Of course, out here in the country we would not be able to view the houses in the dark anyway. No street lights.

My urban friends didn't think that this was so unusual. They said the city is alive 24/7 and one time of day was much the same as another. "Even at midnight there are plenty of people on the streets," they said. I thought, "It's the people who are the problem, guys," but I held my peace.

Sam Combes (10th dan, aikido) replied that visiting a potential new neighborhood at midnight was a very good idea, just to see what goes on there at night. He said he would have dialed 911, too, just to find out how fast the police come when called. As for getting out of the car, he said, "It's not a good time of the day to make new friends."

[HanshiClayton]

I heard "Bam", something had hit my ford escape.

As mentioned by SHOJIKISHO, above, street criminals have several strategies to initiate a mugging, and making a dent in your car is one of them. It is more usual for them to rear-end you lightly at a stop light in order to get you out of your car, but the fist on the fender obviously works, too.

I believe that I would just have kept driving. I have in the past. Some of my correspondents said that this scenario is fairly common in New York, and often signifies next to nothing. New York often seems a remarkably hostile place to those of us who live to the left of New Jersey.

I enjoyed the warning about the baby seat, and the egg-on-the-windshield strategy sounds diabolical. The warning about stretches of road beside bushes or grassy fields didn't resonate with me, because that's almost every mile of road within 50 miles of my house.

We need to educate our students about common mugging ploys. "Hey, mister, do you have a light?" "Do you have change for a dollar?" Just say no. Don't put your hand in your pocket. Don't open your purse.

And don't stop the car.

[HanshiClayton]

I backed up, got out and went behind my car and the three were waiting.

Virtually everyone who heard this story immediately asked, "Why did he get out of the car!?!?!?"

Our correspondent is asking himself that question. Apparently, getting out of the car seemed like a good idea at the time. After midnight, many bad ideas sometimes seem like good ones. This is why we impose a curfew on our teenagers.

We just have to face that discovery about ourselves. In the rush of the moment, otherwise intelligent people often make mistakes.

[HanshiClayton]

1 started peeling off his jacket muttering something like "you want some", as he seemed to be stepping forward. He is standing to my left, 2, slightly to my right and 3, a few steps away, again to my right.

One reader questioned that this was adequate reason to attack. We'll never know, but our correspondent might have started a fight that would not otherwise have taken place. (For that kind of judgement, you just have to be there, and we weren't.)

So the fight is on! Now we're talking tactics. Three opponents will try to surround you, to put you into the center of a triangle.

Your response is to maneuver to the outside of the triangle. You can't stand still. If you do, three fists will meet in the center of your head.

For the karateka, either a blitz attack that puts #1 on his back and runs over him, or a tai sabaki response to bypass him, will let you break out of the triangle.

Jujutsu people can do a lot more. In our class, we practice the situation where you are inside the triangle and three opponents all swing at your head at the same moment. Many jujutsu throws catch that swinging arm and put the attacker on the ground, with the side-effect of letting you change places with him. When he hits the ground he is in the middle of the triangle. You are now one of the points.

All of the above have the effect of moving your head momentarily out of reach of #2 and #3, whose punches miss.

If you are comfortable with the throw, it is pretty easy to toss #1's body into the legs/feet of #2. When you get the knack of that, it is also pretty easy to catch #2's hair at that moment and pull him forward so he falls across #1. I use my shin to pin #2's skull to the ground while using my two free hands to deal with #3. Sometimes I can get #3 stacked up across the first two, but I don't count on it.

It is all as dynamic as an eggbeater, but the basic strategy is sound. With a little practice you can put two on the ground criss-cross and in pain, and then decide what to do about #3.

You must not slug it out from the middle of the triangle. That gives them all the advantages.