On Mark Vaughan and conflicting narratives…

Sometimes, in the dark of night, I have to confess I’m really no better than the people I rant against. When I want an event to support my preferred narrative, I’m also prepared to ignore or minimize relevant facts.

Yesterday’s big news item involved a disgruntled former employee/Muslim jihadi whacko who stabbed and beheaded a lady in the front office and was working on a twofer when a guy with a gun put a stop to his antics. Since everybody in the country has been waiting all week for the first disembodied head to show up, no doubt the Islam-haters are having their own field day. But let’s stick to the really important topic, which is of course gun rights*.

The news industry has been on board for years with the narrative that ‘civilians’ with guns are a danger to their neighbors, and that no legitimate act of armed self-defense ever happens.

So when a good guy with a gun stopped a bad guy with a knife, there was only one way the establishment press could ever imagine that happening, and it involved a uniform. So to them, that’s exactly the way it was. Hence:

Off-Duty Cop Stops Beheading Attack by Shooting Suspect

The article purports to report that…

Mark Vaughn (sic) is both an employee of the company Nolen attacked and a police officer. He was off duty at the time of the attack.

Technically it appears to be true that Mark Vaughan is an employee of Vaughan’s Food, if by ’employee’ you mean COO and President of the company his parents started. The guy’s a millionaire several times over. This would seem to preclude the possibility of his also being an off-duty cop.

There was nothing contradictory about his being a corporate suit and also a ‘Reserve Sheriff’s Deputy,’ because that title has long been passed out like party favors to contributors and other bigwigs. Sheriffs are elected, after all. In the days before concealed carry licenses became easy to get, it was very common for anybody who wanted to carry a gun legally to seek a ‘reserve’ badge. It was a lot easier if you were rich. I assumed that was what was going on here. Because that fit my narrative.

And maybe that’s still mostly what was going on in terms of Vaughan’s involvement with the local Sheriff’s Department. But in confidently trying to confirm my own prejudice on that score, Uncle Joel ran into an inconvenient truth…225
Over the decades I’ve met any number of rich “reserve sheriff’s deputies.” I’ve worked for a few. None were ever ‘off-duty cops,’ because none of them were ever on duty. They weren’t really cops. I never saw one in a uniform.

However I’ve also worked with a few reserve deputies who did have uniforms, because sometimes they actually did do police work. And that may be (he reluctantly conceded) what we’re looking at here.

With or without the uniform, Mark Vaughan bravely did the right thing and deserves all the kudos he’s likely to get for a while.


*Hey, it’s my blog and I’ll assign the priorities.

About Joel

You shouldn't ask these questions of a paranoid recluse, you know.
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11 Responses to On Mark Vaughan and conflicting narratives…

  1. MamaLiberty says:

    Indeed, and I like your priorities. 🙂 In any case, Mr Vaughn seems to be an unusual example of a really good guy, who did a really good thing in SPITE of being rich, and having a uniform. Life is just full of surprises. 🙂

    I just wish he’d been closer to the ladies to start with, moved faster, or had better shot placement. We can always find something to gripe about. But regardless… he done good.

  2. Ben says:

    As far as I know, the difference between a reserve officer with a uniform and one without a uniform, is if said reserve officer is rich enough to buy his own uniform. My favorite example is Shaquille O’ Neal. Can you imagine Miami Beach reserve police officer/police groupie Shaquille O’ Neal doing any real police work? Or even fitting in a patrol car?
    (Him in uniform): http://ishouldnothavetheinternet.blogspot.com/2011/12/biggest-post-ever.html

    But yes, I have no problem with Mark Vaughan’s actions in this case.

  3. When a cop does the right thing I’ll admit it. It doesn’t excuse him being a cop, though. Like, if a cop responds to a 911 call and actually helps save a life. Yeah, it happens, but the uniform doesn’t make their act special or inevitable. It’s just that they happened to be in the right place at the right time and d the right thing. Just like if a mugger saw someone being raped and stepped in to stop it. Everyone is capable of doing the right thing, and I will happily acknowledge them when they do… but it doesn’t excuse the bad things they do on other days.

  4. Mike says:

    From what I heard it was an EBR (evilblackrifle) not a handcannon like yours he used to stop the badman

  5. Tam says:

    I have heard reports (which I have not confirmed, but why wait for that? Nobody else does,) that he ran to his car to fetch a piece, and if I had a Glock in the glove box and an AR in the trunk, you’d better cool believe it’s the trunk key I’ll be fumblin’ for.

    If so, that raises a couple further interesting questions:

    1) Did Vaughan Foods have a No Totin’ policy?
    2) If so, was the COO, despite being not only the top banana but also a reserve po-po, following that policy?
    3) Also if so, will that policy be changing in light of recent events?

  6. Tam says:

    Nosing around, it does seem from this account (the most detailed I’ve found yet) that Vaughan fetched a carbine from his trunk. Which makes sense, because if I’m heading off to shoot somebody, I’m grabbing the biggest heater I have access to.

  7. pax says:

    The cop at the presser (here) seemed to think Vaughn had not left the building to fetch his gun during the event.

    Conflicting reports in the aftermath of a high profile event. Go figure.

    As for the rest? I think what we have here is an all-around good person who volunteered his own time to get some significant training (by law, OK requires an 8-month, 2 night a week academy for reserve cops; the story linked above said he’d gone to a 10-month academy and then had extra training above that). As a member of the county’s FAST & Tac Teams, I think it’s safe to say that he didn’t just volunteer his time to get trained; he also volunteered his time to do the work too.

  8. Tam says:

    Sorry, my link didn’t show: http://newsok.com/oklahoma-beheading-attacker-had-just-been-fired-from-food-company-police-said/article/5345835

    Nothing the officer said in the Q&A seems to conflict with the timeline of Vaughan retrieving an AR on the way to shoot the nutjob.

  9. Buck. says:

    I’ll let it be known that my business has a carry policy in place. I carry on company business. Of course, I’m the business. There wouldn’t be much likelihood I’d be out looking for the rifle in the car, either. My 12 gauge is 6 feet from me. There’s a handgun 10 inches from me. There’s also a hand carved war club a few centimeters away right next to a container full of thumb tacks….rusty ones. And a big slobbery dog.

    BTW, Joel, the “buy me a badge” policy was alive and well right up to the end of Sheriff Mike Corona’s tenure as top bribe taker with a badge here in OC. Well, right up until the guy he sold a badge who had never been a cop but suddenly needed to be a top admin at OCSD let his soon to be very popular in prison kid video record himself raping drunk and underage girls in abandoned houses.
    That practice sort of died with Corona as he tossed his wife under the go to jail bus he managed to avoid.

    So I contend that your assumptions remain reasonable even if not correct in this particular instance.

  10. Robert says:

    Joel, your awareness of your confirmation bias does make you better than many people. And being capable of concession, however reluctant, is a feather in your cap. No comment here re the incident as I weren’t thar.

  11. Tam says:

    Joel, your awareness of your confirmation bias does make you better than many people. And being capable of concession, however reluctant, is a feather in your cap.

    Because it’s worth saying again.

    I am trying hard to get there.

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