Good Job, Marine

On Friday, a (suspected) burglar(who was caught in the act, but we still have to say 'suspected'), got caught in the wrong house.

Home for the Holidays, 22-year old Marine Corporal Alex Pohle returned to his parents house to find the door open and his dog sitting out of the front yard.  Realizing something was amiss, he left his wife in the car to call the police, and went inside to investigate.  Inside the home, he encountered 43 year old entrepreneur(or 'suspected thief') Christopher Schwanke, whom he proceeded to 110% Marine on, subduing him with some type of choke hold, and keeping him restrained until the police arrived.

Corporal Pohle, you are one heck of a man.  It's almost too bad that 'suspected' burglar(who has a 27 YEAR criminal record) didn't give you an excuse to snap his neck instead of just choking him out.  In fact, I'm impressed the young Marine had the discipline to 'stop the threat' without going too far. 

So, major standing ovation for Corporal Pohle.

I'm very glad it all worked out for him, and didn't end worse.  I am not sure that presented with the same scenario I would have responded the same way.  Let's say I came home from work, and found the front door wide open, and my wife's car was not around, and something just didn't 'feel right'.  I use the 'coming home from work' scenario to explain why I would be unarmed, and why I am not sure I would rush right into the house. 

This Marine got lucky in that his parents house only occupied by one unarmed(or too surprised to go for his weapon) 'suspected' thief.  Rushing into an unknown situation like that is risky, and, unless I suspected my family was in danger inside, I think I might just default to 'call it in and observe'.  Even in this case, the bad guy was trying to make off with moms jewelry, and dads hunting knife.  Things could have gotten ugly if he has his hands on one of dads skinning knifes when the Corporal burst in. 

If there was a strange car in my drive way, I would pull in and block it, but I'm not going to seek an encounter with unknown numbers and sizes of bad guys.  I'm not now, and never have been, a 22 year old Marine.  I used to wrestle and play football, and I can still be semi-intimidating when I'm not wearing superhero aprons, but I'm still not going to be looking for trouble.