U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- We know that honest citizens defend themselves with firearms thousands of times a day. These defenders also save strangers. What is more unusual is that sometimes those heroic events are reported in the news. Here is how Kelcey Willis saved a five-year-old boy last week in Warner Robins, Georgia.
What do you do on the weekend? Kelcey Willis, the defender in this tale, was taking his car to Walmart to change the oil that Sunday. It was about 2 pm when Willis and a friend talked to the technician at the auto center. They were distracted by a child’s scream coming from the parking lot. They turned and saw an older man forcefully taking a child from a car and pulling him across the parking lot.
At first, the defender thought this was a kidnapping, but then he wondered if the adult was taking the child into the privacy of the trees so the child could go to the bathroom. The child kept yelling in fear. That didn’t make sense if they only needed privacy to go to the bathroom.
The defender again heard the child yell, “Don’t beat me!” That moved him to follow the boy and the man. The defender later said he got his gun, and it isn’t clear if that means he got it from his holster or truck. The armed defender and his friend ran to follow the older man and the young boy so they wouldn’t lose sight of them. At first, they followed the child’s screams.
When the two men caught up to them, they found the older man holding the young boy on the ground with the older man’s hands around the boy’s neck. The armed defender, Kelcey Willis, ordered the attacker to stop. They pulled the young boy to safety. Other people arrived. They comforted the boy and helped hold the attacker.
The news stories are not clear about who called 911 to ask for help. It also isn’t clear how long it took for the police to arrive. The police said that the attacker was being held at gunpoint by Willis when they arrived. The boy said his attacker was going to “beat him and leave him for the animals.” The armed defender was worried that if he’d waited any longer, the attacker would have “choked the child cold,” and “the kid would probably be dead.”
The attacker, 67-year-old Haimnarine Doobay, was arrested and charged with aggravated assault and cruelty toward a child. Early news reports called this a kidnapping. The child was identified as being five years old and was taken to the county juvenile department for care. Later, the attacker was identified as being related to the child. Reports that I’ve been able to find did not explain how the child and his attacker were related or if the attacker had permission to take the child. We don’t even know if the child arrived at the parking lot in a car driven by the attacker.
The state of Georgia is now a constitutional carry state. The defender didn’t need a state permit to carry a personal weapon on his body. Whether he had a carry permit or not, I bet the defender wishes he had more training so he knew what to do and could have reacted faster. Anyone would.
This story is one of many that goes underreported by the mainstream media because it shows a positive image of a law-abiding gun owner using that tool to defend their life and family. It is our responsibility at AmmoLand to report these stories to you the reader. While we will continue to report these stories, groups like the Crime Prevention Research Center, led by Dr. John Lott, are fastidious in studying the use of firearms for self-defense. Stay up to date with all news on self-defense by following CPRC and Ammoland.
Original News Sources
- FoxNews- Man holds suspect
- WGXA Macon Georgia- Local man rescues child
- Western Journal- ‘Gut instinct’ overtakes gun-toting hero
About Rob Morse
Rob Morse writes about gun rights at Ammoland, at Clash Daily, at Second Call Defense, and on his SlowFacts blog. He hosts the Self Defense Gun Stories Podcast and co-hosts the Polite Society Podcast. Rob was an NRA pistol instructor and combat handgun competitor.