SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — Friends say Sandra Mize is soft-spoken with a great laugh, but don't mess with the 63-year-old grandmother of 10.
When she was awakened by an intruder smashing through her backdoor early Wednesday she grabbed her gun and confronted the man. When he kept coming, she fired the gun for the first time in 30 years.
She missed. The man sat down and waited while she called 911. After officers took the intruder into custody they gave Mize a junior police badge, The Spokesman-Review reported Thursday (http://bit.ly/16z6rMS ).
"Having a firearm in your home for personal protection, I guess we got to see the value of that last night," said Police Chief Frank Straub.
It's a hotly debated issue in Spokane where a suspected car thief was shot and killed by the owner nine days earlier about a mile from Mize's home. Prosecutors are deciding whether to charge Gail Gerlach in the death of Brendon Kaluza-Graham. Gerlach said he thought the thief was going to shoot him.
"I could let my car drive down the block," Mize said. "That doesn't bother me. Someone in my home bothers me."
