Outside Shirley Bennett’s home in Lakemore hangs a sign that reads: Forget about the dog, beware of the owner.
She very well could make a similar sign for her SUV.
Bennett, 39, and a card-carrying concealed weapon holder, fired a single shot from her .38-caliber revolver in a successful effort to fend off the man during an attack outside an East Wilbeth Road bank Thursday afternoon.
“I honestly believe I would not be here today if I didn’t have a gun,” Bennett said Friday. “I’m just glad I’m here today and not in the obituaries tomorrow.”
Bennett trained with her boyfriend and obtained a permit to carry her gun after an attempted break-in at her home three years ago. At the time, she was a single mother of two teens.
She said the break-in attempt made her feel vulnerable to the whim of criminals. She didn’t like the feeling.
On Thursday, she said, her training took over in the parking lot of the PNC Bank branch. Police say a man confronted Bennett as she left the bank and was about to get into her 2007 Mercury Mariner.
In an attempt to at least steal her SUV and perhaps take her along, the man confronted Bennett, a truck sales office manager, in the parking lot about 4:30 p.m. He tried to push her into her vehicle, police said.
“He was hitting me from behind, trying to force me into my vehicle,” Bennett said.
Bennett struck the man with her elbow, then was wrestled down across the front seat of the SUV. While lying on her back, with her assailant atop her, Bennett arched her spine, opened the SUV console with her right hand and pulled out her firearm.
“I said, ‘I got a gun. Don’t make me use it,’ ” she recalled. “I think my heart was going 90 mph.”
While the man tried holding her arm, she fired a shot out of the open passenger door. The assailant had enough. He ran off. Bennett was not injured.
Meanwhile, Akron police officers found Billy Joe Covington, 23, walking several blocks away.
Police say the suspect, who is homeless, admitted he wanted to take the woman’s car and return to California.
Covington is a registered sex offender, according to court records. He was paroled from a state prison in May after serving nearly 18 months for a conviction in Stark County of gross sexual imposition against a woman.
Covington was already wanted by police on escape charges. He is accused of walking away from a community-based correctional facility after parole for failing to register his address as a convicted sex offender.
Jim Irvine, chairman of the Buckeye Firearms Association, which advocates for conceal-carry laws in Ohio, said instances of attacks or robberies are far more common than some people realize. As a result, more citizens are arming themselves, he said.
Ohio recently set another record with the number of conceal-carry permit holders. According to figures released this month by the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, more than 253,000 people are licensed to carry a gun, more than double the number licensed in 2007.
Irvine said the state’s conceal-carry laws, first enacted in 2004, continue to protect ordinary citizens like Bennett.
“We’ve seen enough abductions to know they’re not going to be taken some place for a manicure,” he said. “It’s not going to have a happy ending. And frankly, I’d rather read about someone defending their life than someone being killed by an attacker.”
Phil Trexler can be reached at 330-996-3717 or ptrexler@thebeaconjournal.com.
