Six years later and this story still gives you chills.
For many people, one their greatest fears is being robbed or having someone break into your home. Not only is it a complete invasion of privacy, but it’s also scary to think that someone could come into your home and cause you or your family harm. Of course, it is a reality living anywhere in the world, and much more likely to happen in urban areas, but there’s a number of things people can do to mitigate the risk. Install a security camera or alarm system, have a home protection dog, or the oldest and perhaps most reliable answer… own a firearm.
In 2019, Sturgill Simpson detailed how this fear had come true for him not once but twice within 36 hours, and the wild story of how he handled it.
Sitting down and chatting with Joe Rogan, Simpson tells the story of how his Nashville home was broken into twice, by the same guy, and how the effects of the invasion that sit with him:
“It was everything else associated with what happened after that I found more impactful. You know, the stuff that lasts and stays with you wasn’t what actually happened. It was seeing the aftermath and the system and seeing how it all pans out. But yeah, we had two home invasions within 36 hours I guess.”
The first time his home was broken into, Simpson was awoken from his sleep when he heard a very distinct noise from his backdoor. He quietly woke up and descended the stairs when he heard his dog growl and the backdoor click again. Simpson knew what he heard and was confident that someone had entered and exited their home quickly (thanks to his big but “useless” dog). Simpson waited until the morning to tell his wife about it, but then they notified police as a neighbor caught the would-be burglar on a Ring camera.
Simpson’s wife and children left Nashville and returned to where their primary home is (somewhere else in Tennessee), and Simpson stayed in Nashville as he was working in the studio. While he was home alone, he began working on a firearm he had recently purchased, and before going to bed, he locked everything up but kept the gun right next to his bed instead of putting it in his safe. And according to Simson, this was quite the tricked out rifle.
Then, the following morning, Simpson began to hear noises that reminded him of the incident the night before.
“The next morning, it’s like 7:15 am, like the sun is shining, neighbors are going to work, and I hear the backdoor open again… I guess out of paranoia or for whatever reason I grabbed that gun and just went to the top of the stairs to look. I still think it’s the maid, and when I hit the top of the stairs and look down the staircase, it’s the same guy, same clothes, just standing in my living room, just rolling the chord up on my headphones.”
Simpson was shocked to see the same man in his living room, shocked that someone would return to a home they previously attempted to rob. Simpson started down the stairs, gun pointed at the man, head in the crosshairs… and rather than firing on him, Stu asked him the simple question:
“What are we doing here, man?”
And he hit him with the strobe light on his rifle.
The young man looked at Simpson, seeing the gun and the strobe, probably thinking he’s about to die as Stu noted, turned to make a beeline for the door. The intruder jumped straight off his front porch and ran through the back gate, leaving the latch broken and wood splinters flying. The next thing Simpson notes is that about eight police officers were at his home, and all of them asked him why he didn’t shoot the robber. Simpson recalled a whole inner dialog that he had with himself about whether he should shoot the man with his rifle and how he had a legal right to, but he didn’t want to deal with having to defend himself that it was self-defense.
While that inner dialog sticks with Simpson heavily, he also noted how impressed the police were with his rifle. But after the young man was arrested, he appeared in court during, and seeing how he was shuffled into the legal system as just another number, still weighs heavily on him. The man who broke into this house twice also broke into other homes, but Simpson didn’t see a criminal… he saw a lost soul:
“They caught him the next night like three streets over, in the act, doing the same thing. But he had no priors; he wasn’t on drugs, just no direction, probably no discipline, no guidance, no heroes, and I struggle with that. Like, what if I gave him a job?
I never got to talk to him face to face; if he were some punk f**king kid, I would have been, ‘Good luck, man.'”
It shows how compassionate Simpson is that after two break-ins, he can still see the good in the young man who committed the crimes. He lived through and survived most people’s nightmares twice and is thinking about where this young man could have been had he offered him a job. As Joe noted, there’s a lot of people in this country who are set up to fail, but you wonder what could happen if more people took an interest in the misguided, oftentimes fatherless youth in their local communities.
Watch the full conversation:
