Coin dealer Steve Halfon robbed, slain near his Brooklyn shop (Liberty Coin Co.).

I read this in this mornings online Daily News... Be careful everyone!

Thoughts and prayers to Steve Halfon's family and friends...


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A Brooklyn coin dealer died Tuesday after a group of thieves pummeled him near his shop and dumped his battered body a mile away, police sources said.
Steve Halfon, 61, had just closed his shop, Liberty Coin Co. on Kings Highway in Gravesend, and was walking to his car when three men ambushed him just before 5:30 p.m., the sources said.
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Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_...is_robbed_slain_and_dumped.html#ixzz1Vwwri1M2

 

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Thats sad.

 

It sickens me to think our fellow dealers would not arm themselves. Had it been me, BANG,BANG!!

 

The robbery of the coin dealer at the last Parsippany show to the tune of $150K was mentioned last night at the Danbury (CT) coin club. A couple of law enforcement experts spoke about how it is done, how to prevent the liklihood of it (do not be left alone going to your car with your coins, PMs), and how they get away with it. Banks get robbed, at average $5K or less stolen, with the FBI and every other law enforcement agency alerted. That is just a few gold coins. Be careful.

 

Wrong!! What kind of gun rights do you think people have in Brooklyn? If he would have survived by shooting them, he would lose everything and be thrown in jail for 10 years. Sure you could risk it. But get in a car accident and be found with a weapon on you in there and you're going to jail. He would have been considered the criminal.

You see, NY CA and IL protect thugs like this. In IL, the politicians who deny the right to carry are provided with body guards. Some even after they leave office. Oh yeah, and Chicago aldermen have every right to carry to protect themselves.

The rest of us are just dopes that can't handle it (like the rest of the country) and just need to call the super humans, I mean, cops, when you get a chance. Once the crime is over.

Yes, this crime was a grave tragedy but at least mayor Bloomberg made sure a law abiding citizen wasn't carrying a "loaded" firearm around. Rest assured, they're on the case now that this man has been beaten and killed.

 

This sounds more like a hit than a garden variety robbery.

 

Very sad. I pray they catch the losers who did this.

 

We can carry firearms in CA. They just can't be concealed unless you have a permit to conceal them. Some counties withing the state may be different, but thats the law in the area I live in.

 

Two of the dealers I frequent carry arms. Any coin dealer here in California can obtain a permit to carry a handgun.

 

That is sad to hear. Makes me thankful that I live in Texas. In the town where I grew up, when I was in high school (2000) it was common to see a deer rifle hanging on a gun rack in a student's or faculty's car.

 

Very tragic story. My thoughts and prayers go out to him and his family. Few things anger me as much as robbers and thugs committing murder to take what they want.

If I was a coin dealer, or routinely carried large amounts of gold/silver/cash I would certainly arm myself within the confines of the local laws.

Here's a great link to states that allow concealed carry permits and how the laws vary by state.

http://www.carryconcealed.net/

It might not save you in every circumstance, but as the old saying goes; "I'd rather be judged by 12 of my peers than buried by six."

 

I suspect most of the gun nuts who think carrying a weapon would have prevented the attack are delusional. The guy was jumped by three armed assailants. In addition to ending-up dead, the victim would also probably had his brains splattered all over the pavement from his own weapon if he had one.

The real lesson from the story is this: Most of the facilities that owner/operators of coin stores work out of, have profoundly inadaquate security. Had the victim's vehicle been garaged in the building he did business out of, he would have stood a much better chance of making it out alive. His aleged proclivity for carrying large amounts of cash was another easily preventable exposure, there are afterall armored car services that could have serviced his business.

In short, there are a hundred other things that could have been done to prevent the trajedgy, that would have been more effective than carrying a firearm. Especially true since the guy was in his 60s and was hardly any match for muggers 35 years younger than him, even if he had the gun drawn.

 

This story is pretty bizarre. If it was a simple robbery, why would the thugs beat the victim mercilessly, load him into their car, then dump him into the street in what looks like a decent neighborhood (according to Google Street Scene)? Don't most NY muggers just rob their victim and split? Maybe I am underestimating the viciousness of NYC muggers, but that doesn't make any sense unless the thugs wanted to show their victim to someone in that particular neighborhood.

 

I just LOVE the "blame the victim" mentality of some of the posts here. The arguement that "if he had a gun him it would have been used on him" is pure genius too. If he had had a gun he couldn't have ended up any MORE dead but he just might have taken one or two of them with him. The relevent info here is that a member of our hobby was killed and my condolences and prayers go out to the family. Instead of blaming the vicitm lets focus on that.

 

Amen

 

Wait, what?

Not wanting to be beaten to death by a group of neanderthals and owning a gun to protect my family and myself from such low lifes makes me a "gun nut"?

Rest in peace Mr Halfon, you deserved better from your fellow man.

 

Great Post Ziggy. I couldn't agree more. At least level the playing field. Funny how the crooks still carry guns in NY. Dont they know its against the law? The only ones not carrying are the targets, I mean the law abiding citizens.

RIP Mr. Halfon..

I am sure that if these clowns are caught they will serve out their 3 year jail sentence in an air conditioned, 3 meals a day, cable TV and internet access **** hole jail cell.

 

The thugs beat the victim to death-- they didn't use guns. And if they jumped him from behind while he was unlocking his car or loading something into it (which seems to be what happened), then carrying a concealed weapon in all likelihood wouldn't have helped him.

It seems to me that someone wanted this guy dead. Why else would the attackers beat him so mercilessly, stuff him into their car and dump him during apparently daylight hours in what is apparently a well-to-do neighborhood?

 

That was my first thought too but I reckon we are falling into the trap of assuming that these animals feel and think like we do. How many times in recent years have we watched or a read a story of a home invasion motivated by robbery which develops into torture, rape and murder?

Maybe a gun wouldn't have saved this poor man from such a terrible end, who can say. But at the risk of falling into the trap above, if enough of these scum were shot by their intended victims then perhaps it would deter them.

It's pretty clear that the "justice" system is no deterrent. Bernie Goetz did more to make the subways safer than any amount of millions handed over to Law Enforcement whose job seems to be to arrange removal of your body and fill out the paperwork.

 

I understand there are lots of animals out there, and about the home invasions that turn into torture. But those home invasion events seem like they always involve defenseless women. In this case, from the news reports it seems to me that the thugs set out to beat the coin dealer up from the beginning. He was right there at his shop-- if it was going to start out as a robbery, it seems to me that they would have ambushed him as he was locking up his shop, forced him back in, then helped themselves to whatever valuables were inside. And yet, they waited until he was at his car. Then after beating him, they stuffed him in their car, and dumped his body in what looks like a respectable neighborhood in what was apparently daylight hours. I'll admit I'm not a criminal psychologist, but this behavior seems to be too irrational even for the scuzziest of common muggers.

At any rate, I hope they catch the perps and take them off the street permanently.