Apart from a changed name, this is a true post. The incident happened last Friday night. The write up is divided into three sections. The story, The Aftermath, and The Lessons.
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Bang, Bang, BANG! It’s midnight, my wife (8 months pregnant) and I have been asleep for hours, and someone is slamming on our bedroom window.
Confused, but now full alert I rush to the backdoor. Looking out, I lock eyes with one of our residents, Mike. He is wild-eyed and shirtless on a negative 12-degree night. As soon as he sees me he starts yelling, “Help, call 911, call 911!”
We live on a large property with four individual homes. And although we are friendly with all of our resident neighbors, we keep the relationship strictly professional. Rent is all taken care of online, as are any maintenance requests, etc. In short, we treat them in the same professional manner as any of our other tenants.
Any of these resident/owner barriers were out the window though. This is a fellow human in need of help.
I rip open the door and see that his shirt is in his hand, pressed over his chest. Blood is dripping down.
“I’ve been stabbed” he stammers.
The room grows incredible small as every neuron is firing on full. I close and lock the door behind him; he collapses to the floor.
“Breath Mike, breath…”
He is awake and conscious, but clearly running on adrenalin. The color is draining from his face.
I grab the phone. “Hello, 9-1-1…”
The police arrive first and immediately separate us. The questions come rapid fire:
“Who did this? Are they still in the house? What time did this happen?
Motioning to our knife block, the officer questioning me asks if I stabbed Mike with one of the knifes.
He’s just doing his job I know, but a new, deeper feeling grips me. Is this how innocent people go to jail?
When the two officers convene is clear Mike was able to provide them with good information. I hear them call in a vehicle description and a name. A jealous ex-lover of Mike’s girlfriend. Someone he had filed a complaint against 3-week prior for threatening .
The paramedics are here by now and I cannot tell from their casual demeanor if everything is okay, or of they are pretending for Mike’s benefit. The last thing he says as they bring him out the door is, “I am fading…”
Family first, I head to my wife and together we practice some of the breathing techniques we’ve been readying for the impending birth. Deep breath in, hold, hold, nice slow exhalation….
A half hour later brings me to the hospital. I bring an extra sweatshirt for Mike, his is still laying, bloody on our kitchen floor (the police came and collected it the next morning).
The hospital can tell me very little, other than it doesn’t look good. “He is very sick” is the euphemism they use. He’s going to be flight-for-life’d to a larger hospital, one better equipped to handle this type of injury.
For some reason, I sit at the hospital and wait until I hear the helicopter. Knowing there is nothing else I can do, I slowly walk to my car.
AFTERMATH
Mike lived. He is still in the hospital, in critical but stable condition. The knife missed his heart by two centimeters but it hit an artery. The doctors had to break open his chest and perform emergency surgery. They have told him to expect a 7-month recover time.
The jealous ex-lover was caught within 30 minutes of the incident.
I changed the locks the next day on Mike’s house. One of the things he mentioned while laying on our floor was to not let anyone into his place. His girlfriend (not on the lease) tried to get in the next day and I said no. She was upset. When I was finally able to speak to Mike he confirmed that he didn’t want her in there. There was perhaps some cheating going on.
We only have a weekly paper here, so not sure what charges will be filed etc. I will know more on Thursday.
LESSONS
-We live in a small (6000 people), rural mountain town in Colorado. Apart from a stolen bicycle every now and again, not much happens here. It’s very chill. This can happen anywhere.
-I have systems for late rent, evictions, repairs, but nothing for the death of a resident. The time to be navigation that terrain is not while it is happening. I am now building out this system. I hope to never use it.
-Securing the property. I glossed over it above, but Mike’s girlfriend was really upset with us. Her boyfriend had been stabbed, was in the hospital and the big, bad landlord would not let her into his house. She tested my resolve, but ultimately we stayed strong and this was the right decision.
-Fatal wounds can have a surprisingly small amount of blood. The wound went deep not wide. Don’t underestimate.
-Additional residents. The lease was with Mike. As his girlfriend started to spend more and more time there we talked about having her do a background check. Ultimately we broke our system and didn’t follow our lease about number of days guests can stay per month before needed to do the full gamut. It may or may not have prevented this situation, but we won’t make that mistake again.
-Communication Plan. Neighbors began to call early the next day, curious about what happened, but mostly concerned that something went wrong with my wife’s pregnancy. My wife and I didn’t discuss what details we would reveal and what we wouldn’t. We got aligned quickly, but having a general communication plan for a resident incident already in place would have been helpful.
-Writing. I cannot express how cathartic it’s been to write this down. Thanks BP, I hope you got something out of it as well.
