It Can Happen Anywhere!

Today was just another day in the fight against Houston crime as I, Jerri Stephenson, fought the bad guys fist to fist and came out pretty much a loser.

You know how when you're driving down the street and pull up to a red light where a disheveled man or woman is standing on the curb asking for money or any help possible? Well, they are all over Houston and I'm tired of giving them my money. I'm sure some of them make more than I do. In fact, I know they do! They should be giving ME money. Today I resolved to help them in other ways... I decided to give them granola bars.



I stopped in at Krogers on my way home today to buy granola bars which I have decided to hand out to the people standing on the side of the road. Now, I can no longer avert my eyes, while feeling ashamed and pretending I don't see the people standing by my driver's side window asking for help. I will help them. I will give them nutritious chocolate chip granola bars.

While in Kroger I decided that if these people are hungry they are probably thirsty and hot standing out there all day in the Houston heat and humidity. So I decided to buy a 24-bottle case of Ozarka water to give them water as well. As I'm walking out to my car in the parking lot with the case of water bottles in my arms while in my head patting myself on the back for how smart and good I am to be so helpful I notice some suspicious guys hovering around my Jeep. As I walk closer I see that they have knocked out the window on my rear driver's side window and are reaching into my car for whatever they can reach.

They see me walking toward them and begin to quickly jump into their getaway car which is backed in beside mine. They have the doors open and one of the guys is getting into the back seat quickly on the side closest to me. Not really knowing how to confront these guys who have broken into my car I do the next logical thing: I throw the case of water at the head of the guy closest to me and begin pounding him with it! He fights me but I keep hitting him as hard as I can with the water until finally the drivers start driving off and I fall back onto the pavement into the glass from my window. I watch the guys drive off and reach for my phone to take a picture of the car and license plate only to realize I don't have a picture phone!

The guys are driving a maroon Buick but instead of a license plate it just has a "Carmax" sign for a license. I think to myself, "how convenient."

I don't know what to do next because my hands and arm are bleeding so I realize I need to call 911. When the police woman arrives she shakes her head in disbelief as I tell her what happened. I can't tell her what the guys all look like because I was too busy pounding one of the guys head with water bottles! Another car was broken into the day before she tells me but there are no witnesses. I tell her that I guess I wasn't afraid because the guys looked like "normal" guys. Not like "thugs" or criminals. She says that if the guys had broken in and stolen anything it would have been a simple misdemeanor but because I actually fought the guys and was hurt it became robbery and assault which is a FELONY! She writes up the report and says to me, "There are two things I want to tell you: What you did was incredible brave and the bad guys don't always look like thugs. They could have stabbed you, shot you or pulled you into the car, taken you with them, raped you and killed you." In other words, you were incredibly brave and incredibly stupid!

So, the good news is I caught the guys in time that nothing was stolen. The bad news is it's probably going to be about $1500 to replace the window and my insurance deductible is $1000.

So after all the drama is over and I'm on my way home with my broken window and a bloody arm, I pull up to a red light with a guy sitting on an upside down bucket on the side of the road. I roll down the window and with my still bloody arm I hand the guy a granola bar and bottle of water. He looks at it, throws it on the ground and asks me for a dollar!