Even with the help of the book, I can’t.

A resident says he tried to stop the people who shot and killed a 36-year old man in a Clayton County apartment.

Police found the man’s body at the Overlook Apartments in Jonesboro Thursday night.

Jacob Kervin says he heard the gunshots, then noticed young people running so he drew his airsoft gun.

“Gunshots happened, the kids had pole-vaulted off of the back porch 7 foot, 8 foot drop, ran at me,” Kervin said. “I shot off four rounds, might have missed because it didn’t do anything to them. I ran a few feet, they slid under the dumpster where’s there is a rain ditch.”

Kervin says he later discovered his neighbor dead. He believes it was a home invasion.

Let me restate that, as much out of my own sense of amazement as anything else.

Mr. Kervin was (presumably) busy grading his favorite flavors of paint chips when he heard gunshots and saw people running from the direction of the gunshots. His immediate reaction was to draw his airsoft gun at the sight of these people fleeing a shooting, and point it at them.

He then opens fire on “kids” running at him (or at least in his general direction; they didn’t seem to even acknowledge his presence) without seeing any sort of weapon, or them issuing any sort of threat. If the gun had been real, this is what we would call “assault with a deadly weapon,” and “attempted murder.”

Kervin is then amazed that his 6mm plastic bullets, which have the penetrative capabilities of stale marshmallows, have no effect whatsoever on the young men as they blast past him, and escape.

Authorities are still searching for suspects in the fatal home invasion, which took the life of a 36-year-old man.

We still don’t know if the boys Kervin shot at were suspects, or terrified bystanders fleeing the scene of the shooting.

Folks…

• The only thing worse than inviting yourself to a gunfight is inviting yourself to a gunfight armed a fake gun.
• You may not randomly open fire at unarmed people, even with a fake gun. They would more than likely be legally justified in returning fire with real guns.
• If you have someone in your home not smart enough to recognize either of these facts, please take their toy guns to the dump, where they belong, before they get themselves killed.