Have you ever dialed 911? Why?

Ex (we will call him Joe) and I were walking out of Walmart, and saw a really dusty Jeep with "PUSSY" written huge on the back window, clear as day. We stopped briefly to look at it and had a little laugh, and right as we were walking off, we hear an older woman yell "Thanks for that, assholes!" Confused, we turn around and I just barely catch a glimpse of Joe being caught with a sucker punch right to the jaw/ear. I'm very non-confrontational, so I try to quickly explain in a panic that we did not write it and we simply stopped to look at it and I suggested that they should get a car wash because it's inappropriate. The grumpy woman is having none of it and started getting in my face while her punk-ass kid is jumping around in a boxing stance around my ex. Joe did not even raise a finger at this kid at this point, but I didn't want to prolong it in case something else happened.

I end up grabbing Joe by the arm and pulling him away while the mother is screaming profanities at us and the kid is still hopping around, fists up. We get to his car, and I grab my cell phone to dial 911 right as the kid lands another punch, right on his cheekbone. He still kept his hands down, knowing it'll just cause more problems if he hit back and actually injured the kid or knocked him out (Joe is a big guy, this kid was a broomstick at best.) I was busy telling the dispatcher our location and what was going on while Joe was taking/dodging punches from this kid and the woman was screaming at the top of her lungs and kicking and drawing dicks all over his car, saying "How do you like it, you prick? How do you like having shit written all over your car, huh?"

Right as I'm about to hang up and announce that the police are on their way, the two run to their car. We hop in and follow them as I stay on the line, updating them that we're on the move. I give them the plate number and direction, until we realize where they're heading. They are driving themselves to the police station. We pull in, and the dispatcher tells us that officers are on their way out to greet us. The woman steps out of her car crying hysterically, saying "He shoved me onto the back of my car! He tried pulling a knife on my son! He drew all over my car!" while we sit there calmly explaining to the other officer exactly what happened and told them that it was right in view of the parking lot cameras and we insist they take the evidence as we have nothing to hide. They end up bringing all four of us inside and questioned us separately. Both Joe's and my own stories matched up, while the mother and son's were totally different from both each other's and ours. Plus, the marks/swelling on Joe's face and lack thereof on the other two's spoke louder than our reports.

After all was said and done and they came to a conclusion, they told us some backstory. It turns out that the mother was in a very abusive relationship, and the son was her protector for years, hence why he was so defensive of her and her property and was really shaken up and apologetic for reacting the way he did. We felt for him, but running up and suckerpunching someone in the face is not a way to go about things, so we agreed to press a battery charge. This would require us to go to court a month later, but after thinking it over, we decided against going which led to the charges being dropped. We really felt for the kid, and for him being only 18 and it not even being a horrible event, we thought that maybe the pending battery charge and the outcome of his actions would be enough to help set him straight out of his current mindset.

/r/AskReddit Thread