A Black family was in distress on the side of a country road in Georgia when a white man stopped his truck and approached—but instead of helping, he pulled out a gun.
The situation would strike terror in the heart of any parent, but luckily, the father kept his composure while another child filmed the ordeal.
Mom Heather Gaddy posted the video to TikTok, where it’s gaining views and sparking outrage.
Her young daughter was enjoying an off-roading adventure with her dad and two siblings in Toombs County. Considered part of Georgia’s agricultural “heartland,” the rural area has nearly 30,000 miles of back roads to explore, and the girl’s ATV got stuck in a muddy ditch alongside a road.
@qatesqueen thank goodness my children’s father kept his cool! this happened in toombs county Ga #fyp #viraltiktok #viral #mad ♬ original sound – heather Gaddy
Her dad was using his all-terrain vehicle to pull her out when a white, older male walked toward the dad and his children — ages 8, 15, and 16 — holding a handgun in his right hand, pointed at the ground.
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“Thank goodness my children’s father kept his cool,” Gaddy wrote in the caption. “If you don’t see this as a problem, you’re part of the problem!!!”
When the dad expressed concern, telling the stranger he didn’t “appreciate” the gun and “you should have left it in the trunk,” the man then tucked it into his waistband and came closer.
“We run into the ditch. You pulled your gun out, and I got kids out here,” the shocked father told the man, who claimed he didn’t see the children and was only coming over to help. The dad called him out: “You didn’t see the kids? That’s a damn lie!”
Commenters agreed, with one person speculating, “He stopped with the intent to intimidate them.”
Another person pointed out the obvious concern: “This is sad. You see ATVs, and your first thought is to pull a gun out? Smh. Whether they were adults or kids, I would immediately ask if they needed help and not think of them as a threat.”
Georgia is an open-carry state with some of the most lenient gun laws in the U.S., allowing permitless carry of rifles, shotguns, and handguns since 2022. No background checks are needed, and residents don’t have to register firearms with the government. While the stranger didn’t break any laws, there’s no question that approaching a family with a gun is suspicious and never a good idea.