#631： How to Prevent and Survive a Home Invasion
Episode Stats
Summary
While we like to think we'd rise to the occasion and readily dispatched with the bad guys, my guest argues that without preparation and training you're likely to flounder. And you should have put more thought into how to keep the invader out of your house in the first place. His name is Dave Young and he's a security expert and the author of How to Defend Your Family and Home Outsmart an invader.
Transcript
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brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast you're lying in
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bed at night and you hear a noise downstairs there's someone in your house and if there is
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do you know what to do while we like to think we'd rise to the occasion and readily dispatched
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with the bad guys my guest day argues that without preparation and training you're likely to flounder
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and you should have put more thought into how to keep the invader out of your house in the first
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place his name is dave young and he's a security expert and the author of how to defend your family
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and home outsmart an invader secure your home prevent a burglary and protect your loved ones
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from any threat we begin a conversation with how dave got involved with security training the
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intensive field research he did for his book and the basic equation criminals use in deciding whether
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or not to make your house a target we then delve into how to tweak that equation to your favor
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beginning with casing your house like a criminal would we go over the vulnerabilities to look for
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as you walk the perimeter of your property and the actual changes you can make to deter would-be home
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invaders dave then walks through what to do if someone does invade your home including the
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criteria to use and picking a place to hide choosing a weapon to fight back and selecting
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an engagement point to confront the intruder we also get into the importance of firearm training
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if you decide to own a gun for self-defense and we end our conversation with the oft overlooked part
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of surviving a home invasion the months and years of psychological and judicial aftermath
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after the show's over check out our show notes at aom.is home invasion
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all right dave young welcome to the show thanks for having me brett so a couple years ago you
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published a book how to defend your family and home it's about home security self-defense how
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to protect yourself from home invasion burglaries but before we talk about that let's talk about
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your background you have a career you created a career for yourself doing self-defense and being
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a security consultant how did that happen well you know i've been actually pretty blessed looking at
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it now going back and looking at it then but when it was actually happening i probably didn't think it
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was too much of a blessing i grew up on the opposite side of the tracks as most people say you know i was
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born in brooklyn new york we moved from brooklyn to hialeah florida when i was six i come back for my
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first day of school and my dad left so my mom raised my brother and i and we you know lived off food stamps
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my mom got involved in drugs at a very young age she died at a young age of 36 from a brain hemorrhage
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so i grew up in the gangs you know if you don't like your house you go out you find another home
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you feel safe in so all the things they tell you not to do i did some of them but i was blessed enough
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to not get too far off the guided path and you know i became a corrections officer a police officer
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first then i had 10 years active duty in the marine corps at six years in the reserves several
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deployment tours during that time and i guess the same reason most people get into the self-defense
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or security or police field is you know you want to help yourself to never feel the way you did when
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you were younger and you realize that there's a lot of people out there that are in those same
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situations that don't know where to go for help so i think that was a decision i made at a young age
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that when it came time and you know experiences what you get five minutes after you have it i think you
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can use a lot of life experiences to really be positive you know stories for others that are in
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the same similar situations and and a lot of your work you know you do teach self-defense but a lot of
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your work is consulting companies organizations on how to prevent conflict before it even happens
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well you know i have over 30 plus years of training and experience as a corrections officer police officer
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marine and right when i got out of the marine corps from active duty i didn't retire i got out of 10
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years active duty as a staff sergeant i took over as director of training for several companies in the
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non-lethal weapons industry and then that just grew into not only training police law enforcement
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and military i was blessed to start a company co-found a company with one of my mentors gary klugowitz
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and we started a company called vistalar and you know we cover the entire spectrum of human
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conflict from that first word that's spoken which is where conflict is usually you know given birth
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at all the way up to the weapons that you use to defend yourself so about five years ago when that
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book first became an idea i got approached by a company to write a book they saw some videos i did
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on youtube on surviving a home invasion talking about the aftermath and so i wanted to do some research
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so i you know we looked at like 100 different home invasion situations and cases and most of them
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the people that were in the house didn't survive those things you know you can always look at
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statistics from the fbi uniform crime report or the national bureau of criminal statistics and
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you know what's a robbery what's a burglary what's a home invasion
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and you know i saw that home invasions took on three different you know platforms you're either
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sleeping in your home get up in the middle of the night to get something to drink and you find out
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that somebody's in your home and they don't want to leave and they take you hostage you have other
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family members there that just gets you know nastier or you come home early from a vacation and find
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out there's somebody already in your home or the worst one is you've had somebody case in your home
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and other houses on the street and you've been blind on what to look for how to identify it could
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it happen to me because you know most people in i've found in the united states they live in the
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world that it won't happen to me you know one of my mentors coach bob lindsey said you can be an if
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then thinker or a when then thinker well i'd rather be a when then thinker because if then thinkers don't
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get a chance to think too far along down the pike so it's not a question of if it will happen to you
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it's a question of when and do you want to be ready for it so all these situations with home
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invasions took on a different a different direction the bottom line is if you prepare for it from the
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very beginning all the way to the end then you'll be better prepared no matter how it happens but if
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you live in the world that it won't happen to me some people think throwing a lock on their door
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or you know turning the porch lights off in the daytime those are all little things you can do but
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if someone's really casing your house you should have some strategies to identify it
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so that's what we focused on after we interviewed all those people so it took a whole year to gather
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the information and then when we wrote the book we wanted it to be 10 chapters specifically focused
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on what to do before it happens what kind of visual deterrence physical deterrence what locks are
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better than this deadbolts you know i was pretty lucky earlier in my career to host a show for
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national geographic called the crash test human definitely not something you put in a resume but
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we got to break through doors and i got to show where hinges and deadbolts and door frames and
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how they interact with each other and that just added to the information that we can provide for
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you know how do you prepare for someone who's breaking into your home where it's supposed to be
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the last great safe place in america is your home well let's talk about that i want to go back to that
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point about home invasions and burglaries how did how does the police differentiate between the two
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or do they well some do and some don't you know the burglary is a person breaks into your home with
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the intent to steal and they steal and they leave and then it could be robbery with assault if there's
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people home and i view as anyone that comes into my home for whatever reason if it's not a wanted guest
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then you know it's an invasion now whether you didn't intend to do that in your heart
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the result is i'm experiencing that with me and my family here and if you have a family it's just as
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if it's probably scarier than if you're by yourself you know you always hear or i always hear those
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monday morning quarterbacks i'd shoot them but yet they keep their gun in a safe they don't have any
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access to it or you know we can have this conversation for years where most people you
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know have a firearm for the emotional security it provides like a teddy bear when you're a kid
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rather than the physical protection it's supposed to serve you when your life depends on it the most
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so i i experienced one you know i was 14 years old we were living in government housing
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my brother was playing in the other room my mom unfortunately was doing drugs in the back room the
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door bursts open two guys running the house with their faces covered with pistols in their hand
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grab us by our hair drag us in down the hallway kick my mother in the face have his face down on the
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floor point a gun to our head ask him where the money's at and they actually the knuckleheads
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broke into the wrong home they should have broke into the apartment next to us they were looking
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for drugs and a money of stash that was supposed to be at this location when you're 14 you don't do
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nothing but put your nose in the rug and you know cry and pray softly and loudly and you know wet
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yourself so you know that's not a plan to have for everybody luckily they um started yelling at each
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other they said this was the wrong house they ran out the door and left my mother couldn't pick up the
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phone and call the cops because she had drugs in the house so we picked up the pieces and you know i
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don't think i slept well until i left that apartment building when i was you know 17 so i think people
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want to know what to do to keep themselves safe but there's a lot of people that are afraid to know
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and i think that if you take the necessary steps and precautions you first of all keep yourself
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emotionally safe because i sleep very well in my home you know my wife and i have a little joke that
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if she wakes up and says can you get me some water i don't wake up but if she says hey i heard a noise
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i'm awake before she is so i have a peace of mind that i'm not worried about these things could they
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happen yes but if they are you're prepared for them i think when we wrote the book it was to give
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people a plan and i don't think there is a a separation between what determines whether it's
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a home invasion or a burglary the fact is if there's unwanted people in your home you don't want
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them there are there some types of homes or neighborhoods that are more likely to get broken
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into than others i don't think there's a certain neighborhood or a certain house i think all
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houses have a certain level of vulnerability and if you can identify what that is and do some things
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with landscaping and lights and locks and signs and create a visual deterrent you there's a there's a
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bad guy equation and it's called you know if you raise their effort and lower the reward you
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discourage the crime but if you lower their effort and increase the reward you encourage the crime
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so i think if you look at that equation look at your own home right now there's some general things
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you could probably do to take you off that i want to break into that house list if that makes sense
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that makes and we'll get into some of these these things these deterrents you talk about in the book a
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few of them but before do i want to do some more little analysis kind of give us an idea of of home
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invasions what they look like in your research like when do home invasions usually occur are they
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usually at night during the day what have you found well the typical home invasion is usually
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done at night when there's less people in the front of the neighborhood to watch the person come up
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to the home whether it's they're driving a car or they're popping the hood in front of your home
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and they're usually done in teams two or more i didn't see any research when it was done by just
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one person usually there was one that created a distraction at the front door if you let them in
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the home that's great then they can't another person came in the back of the home you know very
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few in the movies like where they're going to kick the front door open when the whole family's watching
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tv or eating in the kitchen people that commit crimes don't want to get caught so in their mind
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they're going to do this thing where there's the least amount of witnesses that are in the area to
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watch it to take place all right that makes sense um all right so let's talk about what criminals are
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looking for so you talk about that that equation they're looking for something that's it's an easy
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target where they won't get caught and so one thing you recommend when you're sort of when a person's
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beginning their own assessment of their their home and family security is that basically case your
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house like a criminal and and look for weaknesses in your house so let's put on our criminal cap here
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like what are we looking for what are you looking for in a house for vulnerabilities and weaknesses
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well i think the first thing is you start with the outside of your home and you identify blind spots
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and shadows the way to do this is have a friend or spouse stand at the front door in the doorframe
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looking out of the house and you stand behind certain trees and bushes and i guess figures that you
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have in your in your yard and ask the person can they see you and when you start finding places that
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people can see you but you can't see them you identify blind spots if you walk around the whole
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perimeter of your home if you're living in a home you know i do the perimeter walk twice a month when
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we first moved into the neighborhood in the backyard there was a tree not in our backyard but in another
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yard but if you stood behind that tree you could see right into our our shower there was also cigarette
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buds some pizza crust some beer cans that were fresh that you could tell somebody is standing there
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watching something so to first walk around your property and see if you can identify any of these
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blind spots and shadows if there's bushes trim them and thin them try to keep the bushes away from the
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home as possible thin them out put the lights behind them you want to create a place that if someone
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is on your yard it would be seen by the neighbors not only the people in the house because that is a
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visual deterrent signs are visual deterrents when you do the perimeter on the outside of the home
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you want a person to see that it's protected by a security company or a dog before they decide to come on
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the property you know if you're riding a bike in the neighborhood and you're looking at three houses
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and you see one house doesn't have anything one house has a sign on the front yard that says you know
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secured by adt and another one has a sign on the yard saying beware of dog which house would you want
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to look at a little bit more closely probably the one that doesn't have anything so there is a certain
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value for a visual deterrent once you get the visual deterrence in place then look at what's in your
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house and what kind of shadows are your lights creating you know most people think of a square
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and at the corner of each square they put two lights that branch out but they don't realize that
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they're creating blind spots where someone can walk in from the street all the way up to your house
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and not be seen at night so you want to crisscross your lights you want to possibly have some lights
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shining on the corners of the house not away from the corners of the house so light positioning plays
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an important role so you want signs you want lights you want to trim the bushes you want to have a
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clean yard and you know and don't do something silly like put beware of dog and don't have a dog
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dish or even a chain on the tree because people you know bad guys have a certain level of intelligence
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and you want to create a visual deterrent that it's going to take some effort when you make the
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decision to go into that home to step on the property first when you're also walking around
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your home you want to open up the back doors i open up the back doors and take my thumb and run
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it along the strike plate to see if there's any cuts or wedges in it from a screwdriver if there are any
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marks you know you can cover it with clear nail polish and then go back and check and see if
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there's any more tool marks on it most of the time people will try to break into your house without
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getting caught before they decide to burst in the house check the screens you know latches and locks
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do you have drapes you know it's kind of like you spent a lot of money buying some really cool things
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leave it on the back seat of your car when it'd be safe from the trunk so it couldn't be seen
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so you want drapes or blinds on your windows so if someone was standing outside they couldn't see
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what you had in the home you want to reduce their curiosity you want to take away any mental images
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of temptation that hey i want that or i don't know what that is i want to learn more about it so you
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want to really control what a person sees when they look at your home you know during the daytime i want
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them to see a clean house i want them to see you know signs little stickers on the window and i want
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to have my windows closed so they can't see what's on the other side we know now in today's society a
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lot more people are staying home so our burglary is happening we're probably not happening as many
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times now as they were you know before this same time last year but nonetheless people get restless
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you know whenever people lose food water shelter clothing or an ear to listen to they go out and
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take it from somewhere else so that first thing you want to do is create that visual deterrent
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and then as you get closer to the house you're looking for any signs of forced entry or breakage
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into the home screens latch locks footprints around the beds near the windows you know um there's some
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things you can do by sprinkling a little baking soda or talcum powder on the ledge you know you'll even
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see if birds are standing on there there's just little things you can do to create a visual
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deterrent that raise that effort and lower that reward on the outside of the home and signs and
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posters and lights are the best options to have well let's talk about home security and security
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security systems particular and you said there's there's a role for that but you to say the statistic
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like a lot of homes today like very few of them or very few for homes have home security systems in
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place security systems are designed to give you a particular level of comfort within your budget
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most people never think about going out and getting a a security alarm until their house is broken into
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or their neighbor's house is broken into that's why you'll notice as soon as you get your house
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broken into you'll be called by all kinds of security companies because once that hits a a public
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record in the neighborhood that's how they get their leads from a lot of places so you know for me
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myself i look at security as layers and the more layers you have of security starting off with visual
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then possibly auditorial then physical those give you layers of deterrence security physical security
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starts with signs and then i would have something that gives me an alert or detection that someone's
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breached a door or a window whether you're away i get an alert on my phone if i'm home i hear the
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alert you know from my phone near the bed but i have a security system and it just gives me a certain level
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of of safety and i sleep a little bit better at night because it's something else listening for me and
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watching for me while i'm sleeping that's how i would look at security systems what are your thoughts
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about security cameras like the ring doorbell oh they're great yeah anything that gives you a visual
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identifier of who was on your property is priceless because you know cameras record the event
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to give the clues to the police to go out and catch the person that looks like the person who broke into
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your home without the visual i i have you know video surveillance and i'm not bashful with letting
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people know by signs on the property that we have you know video surveillance on the premise right so
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again you're just it's another layer of layer deterrence and even if even if it doesn't deter
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them it allows you to get evidence to prosecute if you need to do that yeah because anything that
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you're going to have for a security system is only going to add to your case it's just going to help
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provide more evidence that they were there whether it's a full facial image or a partial especially if
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they can match prints you're just doing whatever you can as a homeowner to provide additional
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evidence to the police we're going to take a quick break for your words from our sponsors
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and now back to the show all right so let's talk about let's kind of do recap what we've talked
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about so far so your main priority to prevent home invasions just make your house a harder target and
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that's basically the sounds like the main thing is okay you can do these visual things where you say okay
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we've got security we've got dog trespassers will be arrested that can be a deterrent but another layer
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is making it hard for the criminal to hide right you want to make you want basically the criminal to
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be seen at all times so you can do that by adding lights at night around your house trimming your
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landscape so that there really isn't a good place to hide and then also being aware of lights inside
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your home as well another thing you talk about too in the book is besides these these preventative
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measures these things you do make your house less of a target it also requires you to be
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situationally aware of the people around in your neighborhood you can't just sort of turn your
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you know you can't just focus inward you also have to keep your eyes focused outward and see who
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is walking around in your neighborhood and being familiar with the people in your neighborhood as well
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yes if you're a homeowner i encourage you to knock on the door of your neighbors and introduce
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yourself and at least see who they are and what they look like during times of extreme emergencies you
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might need their assistance to call for you or come to your aid so i introduced myself to the
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neighbors on the right and left side of me behind my house and right across the street and over the
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many years of me being here the neighbors across the street had to run into my home because somebody
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broke into theirs and the elderly lady who lived off to the left of me had a burglar in her home that i
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was able to see lights moving on inside the house and i was able to go in and take her out safely and call
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the police so i think you want to you want to know who's in your neighborhood and it starts by just
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taking brain pictures i run in the mornings and now with the heat i run at night but when you walk out
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the front door you know don't just walk with the front door on your phone to your car in your car
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to work step out on the front steps and look and see what cars are parked in your in your neighborhood
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any bodies in those cars we had a situation where i went running one morning and as i walked out of
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the front of the house and i did some stretching i looked off to the right and they were just building
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up some homes there was a car parked in the back and as i looked at the car i realized that there was a
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body slumped over and the guy went into diabetic shock but where he was parked drew alert for me because
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i don't want anybody i have a family to protect and i don't want anybody sitting in the car
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case in the neighborhood or just waiting for someone to leave and then come in my home when
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i have my family there so you really do want to keep your head up keep your head up and your eyes
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open your ears open to who's walking dogs riding bikes doing the power walks because people who are
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going to case your area are going to blend in with the neighborhood first and if you can just be
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friendly and wave and smile and say hello and good morning and get to know who's in your
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neighborhood you could probably deter something from happening into your home another thing you
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talk about that people aren't usually people usually don't think about when it comes to home security is
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being aware of what are you putting outside of your house so like your garbage and that's something
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that criminals use to figure out if you're a target or not it starts with the mail you know don't let
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your mailbox be overflowed with mail and then as you do your property walks we told you about cigarette
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buds but your trash i tie my trash off in a certain way and trash goes out at a certain day during the
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week but it doesn't hurt that if you throw the trash throw garbage in there on monday that if you're
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around your trash can on tuesday i just open up the lid to see if anyone's went through my trash
00:23:21.300
i always put it tie and down so someone has to grab it and lift it up and turn it right side up
00:23:27.760
so creating work it's just easy i throw the garbage in the garbage can but i throw it a certain way so
00:23:36.020
i could go back and look and see if anyone had been in my garbage and one thing that i started doing a
00:23:41.120
while back ago is uh if i'm throwing like documents out like bank statements whatever i shred it first
00:23:47.680
it's sort of this kind of my info security absolutely anything that you can do to kind of wipe the
00:23:55.140
identity of who's living in the home you know you asked me is there a certain time of day that people
00:24:00.200
um people get burglarized or have home invasions well most of your crime rates go up after the
00:24:07.000
holidays because everybody throws all their garbage out with their tvs and their ipads and their laptop
00:24:12.200
boxes in the front yard you know those things you want to cut up and you want to maybe wait a couple
00:24:17.320
days to throw them out throw them out you know maybe half one week and the other half the other week
00:24:22.040
the reason why people go through garbage is look for receipts to see if there's any high value items
00:24:26.900
that you might have purchased and there's a lot of information that now people can shop from their
00:24:32.480
own home people put so much stuff on social media i'm sure you've heard this story before uh but it's
00:24:39.240
going to happen to somebody again i had a friend that goes to vegas he won thirty thousand dollars in
00:24:44.640
vegas took pictures of the thirty thousand dollars uh the next day his house was broken into and guess
00:24:50.320
what was taken what was thirty thousand dollars thirty thousand dollars in the same envelope that
00:24:56.180
he showed it on facebook you know um you really do have to watch what you put on social media because
00:25:02.140
that as people flash through profiles and they see something flashy it'll draw attention to it
00:25:09.260
you know um so you want to manage what you're putting on social media just as much as what you're
00:25:14.380
throwing outside we live in a society now that if you buy a new car you go out and take all these
00:25:19.440
pictures in front of it and show it to all your friends but also your non-friends are seeing it too
00:25:25.320
right i guess we just don't think about it when we get through the excitement of
00:25:29.580
bought a brand new diamond ring for your wife and you take a picture of it in your home
00:25:34.420
and you forgot you took the picture in front of your house which had the address
00:25:38.740
okay yeah people just aren't thinking about celebrations and you know i'm happy i laugh i live i
00:25:46.280
celebrate with my friends you just try not to let anybody outside that close friend network see
00:25:50.980
what you're doing yeah and related to that um you know just being mindful of what you post on social
00:25:56.220
media like another tip i've heard is like don't post while you're on vacation because you're basically
00:26:01.620
just saying hey i'm away from my house and you can rob me yes yes and um you know every one of your
00:26:10.820
friends has had somebody sneak in through another friend into their network by liking them they get
00:26:19.100
to see things about you and learn things about you that you probably don't want anybody else to know
00:26:24.200
people post when they're sick when they're in the hospital when they're on vacation when they're
00:26:28.740
traveling out of town how long they're going to be out of the country and you know those are great
00:26:34.200
for your friends to know but not everybody on social media is your friend yeah exactly all right so
00:26:39.420
that's another like thing to think about being mindful what you're posting on social media as a
00:26:43.280
preventative measure all right so we've talked about some things we can deter and hopefully
00:26:47.300
reduce the risk of being a target for a home invasion but we also have to have a plan for if that
00:26:54.400
home invasion still happens so i know the plan is going to be different for every house for every
00:26:58.680
family because every house every family is different but like roughly speaking like what does a
00:27:02.560
plan for a home invasion look like you know a couple of years ago we um started looking at
00:27:08.840
everybody's program for active shooter because that's what you almost have to look at for a home
00:27:13.440
invasion as an active shooter situation a person enters your residence with a weapon with the intent to
00:27:19.380
kill find you locate you keep you as a hostage and we believe that you should follow a certain
00:27:27.700
model so the first thing is we want you to have a plan of an escape you should have an escape route
00:27:33.780
for every room in your home and this escape route needs to be within the reality of the world that
00:27:40.160
you live in which means if you are 250 pounds and your escape route is a two by four window that's five
00:27:49.480
feet above the air ground that you can't get to that's probably not a logical escape route that your
00:27:56.040
escape routes need to be practiced and every escape route has to get the answers to three basic
00:28:01.160
questions can i get out of the room that i'm in how do i get out of the room that i'm in and where do
00:28:07.160
i go once i'm out of the room that i'm in so you have to have an assembly point with the kids it's easy
00:28:12.880
to play hide and seek you just um i would get the kids scattered throughout the house i'd sit them down
00:28:18.840
and i'd say listen there might come a time that you have to leave the house because uh bad people came in
00:28:23.780
the house and you're going to have to listen to your mom or i if we were to say it's time to go
00:28:28.980
i want you to know what that means that the youngest grabs the next one the youngest and you're going
00:28:34.740
to get out of the house if you're in the bedroom this is how you get out of the window if you're in
00:28:38.560
the living room this is how you get out of the back door and you never want to have an escape route
00:28:43.100
as the way you came into a room so it should always be an another way out now that's just a rule of
00:28:50.560
thumb let's face it if you're in a bedroom you have the bedroom door but you may have some windows
00:28:55.660
and you're going to have to teach the kids to open up the windows we wouldn't recommend you break the
00:29:01.400
windows because not only does it cause more alarm to where you are it also creates other dangers
00:29:06.860
trying to climb out of a window with broken shards of glass but you should have escape routes and this
00:29:12.300
is where knowing your neighbors play an important role one of the persons i talked to when i was
00:29:17.040
writing the book is that they had a home invasion and two of the teenagers ran out the back of the
00:29:22.980
door one went left one went right the one that went left jumped into a um family that had a dog
00:29:29.420
and got bit up pretty bad and the ones that went right ended up being safe so you'd want to know where
00:29:36.240
to go when you got out of your home for me when we get out of our house we go to a big tree that's
00:29:41.720
located in the corner of the yard so we can still see who's coming in and out of the house so all the
00:29:47.900
family members when you escape are going to go to one place to get accountability in the perfect world
00:29:53.940
in the reality they're all going to go to the wind and you have to trust them that they're going to go
00:29:57.700
to a neighbor's house they know how to call the cops they know what to say um that should be all part
00:30:04.120
of that escape route is knowing how to get out of that room if you can't escape and you have to pick
00:30:10.180
a place to hide you have to kind of ask yourself this general question so every place to hide has a
00:30:17.160
criteria um can you see danger coming can you escape from danger and can you defend from that position
00:30:24.240
if you can't answer yes to those three questions and you only really pick the place you're going to
00:30:28.760
die you didn't pick the place you're going to go to survive so you have to be able to escape from
00:30:32.960
it see danger coming and defend from that position if you can't find a safe place to go that fits
00:30:39.700
that criteria you're probably safer to create the illusion that you're not in the room um what i
00:30:46.200
mean by that is take a single level home three bedrooms and opposite sides of the house uh if a
00:30:52.660
person comes into your home they're trying to get get you there's two or three people with them
00:30:57.180
they're trying to find all the family members as quick as possible they're going to run into rooms
00:31:01.700
very quickly they're going to look into common places where people could be if they don't see them in
00:31:06.880
the room look in the closets they're going to look behind the door they're going to look under the
00:31:11.440
bed they're going to look in the laundry basket so if you wanted to create the illusion that you
00:31:15.820
were gone you would maybe open the window break that window and then hide in a place that is not
00:31:20.940
one of those three or four places that we mentioned so as they come into the room they look and they see
00:31:25.200
the window broken they'll probably look at the window and you've created the illusion that you left
00:31:29.920
the room that is probably a little bit safer than just hiding in the closet or underneath the bed
00:31:34.220
so we first want you to escape if you can't escape then you're going to have to pick your engagement
00:31:42.900
points and this is pretty scary for others you know um just because i have a firearm i've been in
00:31:49.680
combat before i i teach people about firearms how to survive real world threats it doesn't mean i want
00:31:55.740
to have them uh you want to try to avoid them so if you don't have weapons you're going to have to
00:32:03.740
pick weapons of opportunity that you have in your home if you're going to pick to defend because you
00:32:08.580
can't escape you can't go to a safe place then your only other option is to barricade and defend
00:32:15.460
so it's escape barricade and defend is the philosophy and when you pick this place to go in
00:32:20.680
your house and if you have no weapons weapons have a criteria if i'm going to pick a weapon to defend
00:32:26.100
myself the first question i want to ask is does this weapon give me what distance from the threat
00:32:31.640
does this weapon allow me the opportunity to protect myself so if i have a knife i got to get
00:32:37.080
closer if i have a stick i can be father but if i have an aerosol can with a with a lighter i can get
00:32:44.220
a little bit farther so what is the distance from the threat number two how much effort do i have to
00:32:49.960
use to put into using this weapon you know we've all seen the the movies the horror movies where there's
00:32:55.620
noise outside the man goes in the home stands at the front door he's got slippers in his hand
00:33:00.560
you know what are you really going to do with a pair of slippers um but also you have to pick a
00:33:05.940
weapon that's not going to take all your energy and effort to use it so if i had my choice between
00:33:11.240
a bat which does give me greater distance or something sharp which slashing and puncturing
00:33:17.020
takes less effort i would more likely probably pick the um the object that's sharp rather than the bat
00:33:24.660
so what distance do i have and then what kind of effort do i have to put into it and then the
00:33:31.280
third question to ask is what are you really trying to do you're trying to blind them cripple them
00:33:35.280
blungeon them knock them out make them unconscious or are you going to have to take a life because the
00:33:41.000
opposite of saving a life sometimes is taking one and are you ready to do that are you emotionally
00:33:46.520
prepared for that are you mentally conditioned for that can you physically see yourself going through
00:33:51.360
that you know i can't tell you how many times i asked this question around the country when we
00:33:55.900
teach our active shooter program i'd say how many of you if there was a kid on the floor whether
00:34:00.540
you know him or not there's a person standing in front of you and you're both on the floor that you
00:34:05.960
would throw yourself over that child to keep them safe and let that person shoot you versus them
00:34:11.240
i raise my hand because i'm included too but i always ask them what if you could create a location
00:34:17.560
that you engage the shooter at the door in a small narrow hallway in the stairwell if you can pick
00:34:24.500
the engagement point now you went from a hundred percent surely dying to maybe you now you have a
00:34:30.600
50 50 cent 50 50 chance of survival so if you can't escape and you can't barricade get into a location
00:34:39.280
you can see danger defend from danger escape from danger and you're going to pick your defense points
00:34:44.360
you're going to have to engage the threat and you're going to have to pick weapons that are
00:34:48.420
going to allow you to engage safely so small narrow hallways are going to be a better place to engage
00:34:54.280
them don't let them come in the room get them at the door so you're going to have to go through your
00:34:58.200
home identify these safe places to go and then also identify your engagement points and you pick the
00:35:05.520
term of engaging on your terms are you truly going to put a plan together to keep yourself safe
00:35:13.100
or you're just gonna hope for the best and hope is great but i'd rather have some training behind
00:35:20.440
my hope than just blind faith well in regards to firearms you said earlier that a lot of people buy
00:35:25.640
a firearm because it makes them it's like a security blanket makes them feel safe but you said if you
00:35:30.400
don't train the firearm can actually become a liability become even more dangerous so i mean how do you if you
00:35:36.800
decide to have a firearm for home security how do you recommend folks train so they're actually prepared
00:35:43.380
for home invasion well you know there's a lot of good people out there that do firearm safety
00:35:47.860
and i think first you have to make the emotional commitment with yourself and your family so you know
00:35:54.020
being a marine i've always had weapons in my home but i've never had an accidental discharge my kids
00:35:58.340
didn't play cops and robbers and point guns at everybody there's a certain level of responsibility that
00:36:03.000
they have to be taught at a young age to respect the firearm and respect life so you have to make
00:36:08.320
that commitment as a family if you're going to bring the gun in the home first have the emotional
00:36:12.260
commitment and understanding that you're going to have to learn the things to keep you safe
00:36:16.600
and then when i made that decision you know i looked at different ballistics and we settled with the
00:36:24.980
nine millimeter for a variety of reasons penetration ballistics recoil the amount of rounds you can get in a
00:36:31.660
magazine but more importantly you know there's a lot of different technology out now and so you know
00:36:36.940
i use frangible ammo in my home so if you get into a gunfight in the living room the gun the bullet
00:36:41.720
doesn't travel three bedrooms down you have to teach the kids to get very low in the home you have to do
00:36:48.920
some practice and training that if you know my wife's in the kitchen with the firearm and we're all
00:36:53.000
getting out of the house how do we move towards her location and get as low as we can so anything
00:36:58.160
that she has to engage is going to be above her waist and we're all going to be moving towards
00:37:03.520
her below the waist so there is some training and planning and the emotional commitment and then
00:37:08.980
you have to go through the firearm safety training nothing replaces trigger time you know there's air
00:37:14.300
soft there's a whole bunch of safe ways of doing training in the home but you know i see people that
00:37:20.800
say they carry firearms but yet when i go over and visit them it's locked up in their bedroom doesn't
00:37:26.500
really do them no good if they're taking a nap in the living room and something happens so if you once
00:37:31.540
you make the commitment to have a weapon in the home now you're going to have to make the commitment
00:37:35.960
and training to where you're going to place the weapon and if i'm going to have a weapon in the home
00:37:41.360
it's going to be in a lock box it's going to be close by it's going to be easily accessible
00:37:45.120
wife's going to know that the password kids are going to know the password my kids are going to know
00:37:50.640
how to safely handle a weapon in case i'm involved in a physical altercation and i tell them to go
00:37:56.180
get the gun you want to create a plan this can't just be i have a gun in my home so my home is safe
00:38:01.780
you make the emotional commitment you do the preparation of safety and training you do the
00:38:06.980
first day training for handling gunshots because you know if you're in a gunfight someone's going
00:38:11.300
to get shot you want to be able to render aid to yourself at least and you have to go to the range
00:38:16.000
you know and i think if you're going to the range and you're engaging in threats
00:38:19.720
8 to 18 feet is probably good for home defense anything over 18 feet probably no need to really
00:38:27.220
engage it unless you have to and in a gunfight in your home you're not hunting the threat you're
00:38:33.040
letting the threat come to you so by knowing the engagement points and knowing where drywall you can
00:38:38.520
shoot from and doors of a hollow core they solid those are all knowing the lay of the land is going
00:38:44.820
to give you the best opportunities for survival if you do end up using a firearm in your home for
00:38:49.740
protection i i remember i talked to one firearms instructor because you know he's big on you know
00:38:54.680
you have to train the way you are preparing for like the way reality is going to be and so one thing
00:38:59.780
he did like like once like every now and then like a week he tell his wife i want you to set alarm
00:39:04.520
randomly during the night like i don't know i don't know what night it's going to be i don't know
00:39:09.280
what what time it's going to be and i'm gonna he basically practiced dry fire like getting getting used to
00:39:14.440
like getting woken up in the middle of the night and like getting to your firearm and i thought about
00:39:18.800
that i was like yeah if that happened to me i don't know how i would do like at the first time
00:39:22.580
someone broke into my house and i had to like find a fire i don't know if i'd do very well if i didn't
00:39:27.160
practice that no you do have to practice because you know when you're scared a variety of impulses take
00:39:33.940
over and if you're not programming your mind on what impulses you need to filter it just delays your
00:39:40.160
response and you really want to respond not react in these situations so you are going to have to
00:39:45.320
train because when you're scared you're going to freeze and that's the worst thing you can do when
00:39:50.520
you're preparing to protect your own life is to freeze all right so we've talked about deterring
00:39:56.020
criminals we talked about what to do in the events you're going to basically do sort of like a plan
00:40:00.500
for active shooter situations have a plan for escaping have a plan for hiding and have a plan for
00:40:07.160
engaging the the the criminal fighting back if you have to if you're going to do firearms make sure
00:40:12.720
you get training make sure you practice one thing i thought was interesting in your book is you talk
00:40:17.340
about what what happens after home invasion because i feel like a lot of self-defense books blogs whatever
00:40:23.020
they never talk about after after the event but you have a whole section on that why do you think
00:40:29.360
that was necessary to talk about well you know um my home invasion happened when i was 14
00:40:35.520
and there are certain things that i that happened to me during the day that i still can go back to
00:40:40.900
that feeling and the emotional scars of of whether it's ptsd whether it's emotional stress whether it's
00:40:48.680
you know abuse whatever the emotional trauma that you have felt over your in your life you're going to
00:40:56.660
always have it unless you address it and i can't think of the most scariest thing is a person to have
00:41:03.800
their home invaded i mean you know most people will move from their location within six months of
00:41:10.140
having their house broken into if they live in apartments they just don't want to be they can't sleep
00:41:14.060
in that house anymore someone's been in their home been on their bed moved their sheets ate their food
00:41:20.100
they feel violated so i wanted to make sure that people knew that you know you have to emotionally
00:41:26.600
protect yourself just as much as you have to do physically that means you need to get to small groups
00:41:32.220
family counseling find a pastor that will sit and listen most of them do a great job with that
00:41:38.440
there's other peer groups that you can get involved in but to just chalk this up that it's no big deal
00:41:44.720
that's that's just crazy you'll you'll never move past it it'll affect relationships
00:41:52.560
your trust factor goes way low because everyone you think you talk to you think is lying to you
00:41:57.840
it'll affect your your relationships with your family with your kids with your jobs it'll change
00:42:03.960
your personality so i wanted to make sure that if anyone was surviving something like that i had
00:42:10.320
nobody to talk to except the kids in the street we just talked about how we find these people and beat
00:42:14.920
them up if we ever did but you know i'm i'm 57 now and i still think about it when i was 14 so i wanted
00:42:24.400
people to know they have to go get help they have to talk to people that will listen there's professional
00:42:28.520
help out there you know unfortunately i don't think we do as good a job as we should for big organizations
00:42:35.660
that experience active shooter these people are going to be traumatized and if you're a survivor
00:42:40.200
it just means you physically kept yourself alive during that moment now you have a whole bunch of
00:42:45.620
years of horror you're going to have to address and focus on i wanted to make sure people knew that
00:42:50.640
they had to identify with it first with themselves come to the acceptance that there was nothing they
00:42:55.580
could have done to maybe prevent it now that it's over they survived it they should be giving
00:43:00.200
themselves thumbs up and now saying i can do this i can survive this i will survive but if they don't
00:43:07.540
believe it in their heart it can just tear them up and ruin them i've seen good people physically
00:43:15.180
survive bad situations and have been emotionally scarred for their entire life and besides the
00:43:21.200
emotional trauma of of the the attack another people people forget about is after the home invasion
00:43:27.920
happens the state's going to prosecute this person and you're going to be involved in that so it might
00:43:33.180
be months or years that you're still dealing with this in some sort of way yeah there was um one case
00:43:39.800
we interviewed that a guy was found and he was found with six driver's license in his possession
00:43:45.040
in the car that he had him and another person broke into six other homes it didn't go to court until like
00:43:51.300
five years later you know criminally they were adjudicated pretty quickly but then the civil cases
00:43:56.400
came in and the lawsuits came in and you know civil lawsuits can last 7 10 15 years so even though you
00:44:04.100
might have survived it on july 1st you're going to be having dreams and recollections of what's
00:44:11.260
happening and having to tell your story over and over again for the next three to five years so you
00:44:16.780
have to take that time to really come to terms with it that you know you do the best you could and
00:44:21.060
you should pat yourself on the back but people choose not to pat themselves on the back and they
00:44:26.700
act like it don't matter and they get worse well dave this has been a great conversation where can
00:44:31.460
people go to learn more about the book and your the rest of your work you do
00:44:34.100
well you know we the company i founded for the non-escalation de-escalation is called
00:44:38.720
vistalar that's w-w-w-v-i-s-t-e-l-a-r vistalar.com we have several books on managing conflict we cover
00:44:47.900
everything from words to weapons in our training you know the last five years we probably expanded
00:44:52.520
our training outside of law enforcement military police to education health care the hospitality
00:44:58.620
industry customer service we're seeing more and more verbal altercations escalate into physical
00:45:04.660
violence so we're trying to do our best to help people manage themselves emotionally represent
00:45:09.540
themselves physically and keep themselves safe mentally and emotionally so you know they can get
00:45:14.780
a hold of me at the website or you can just write me at dyoung at this solar.com and i'll be glad to
00:45:20.060
answer any questions that they have fantastic well dave young thanks for your time it's been a pleasure
00:45:24.100
hey thanks a lot for having me brent my guest today was dave young he's the author of the book
00:45:28.860
how to defend your family and home it's available on amazon.com you can find out more information
00:45:32.740
about his work at his company's website vistalar.com that's v-i-s-t-e-l-a-r.com also check out our
00:45:39.020
show notes at aom.is home invasion where you find links to resources where you delve deeper into this
00:45:43.420
topic well that wraps up another edition of the aom podcast check out our website at art of manliness.com
00:45:55.040
where you can find our podcast archives well as thousands of articles rewritten over the years
00:45:58.380
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