So, here’s a wild story out of the Bronx. 

A local bodega owner named Jhonny Gomez Cordero is currently facing charges after shooting two armed robbers who tried to hold up his store. 

Now, before you jump to conclusions, this one’s a bit more complicated than it sounds. While some folks think Cordero was just defending himself, others are questioning whether he went too far. 

The Incident: A Robbery Gone Wrong

It all went down on December 4th when two men barged into Cordero’s store, both of them armed and ready to make a run for it. The robbers demanded cash and goods, and clearly with no intentions of leaving peacefully. 

In a panic, Cordero grabbed a gun he found in the store’s bathroom (yep, you read that right, he found it in the bathroom). He fires, hitting one of the robbers, and the other gets nabbed by the cops. The guy who got shot ended up surviving and was taken to the hospital.

But here’s where things get a little messy. Instead of just walking away as a hero who saved his own life, Cordero is now facing criminal charges, including possession of a firearm and reckless endangerment. 

Self-Defense vs. Strict Gun Laws

Wait, what? Isn’t this guy just defending himself?

On the one hand, it’s easy to see where Cordero’s coming from. If someone breaks into your store with a gun, your first instinct is probably to protect yourself, right? And, in New York, the law is supposed to allow people to defend themselves if they’re in immediate danger of getting hurt. 

Cordero probably felt his life was at risk, and in that moment, his survival instinct kicked in.

But there’s another side to the story that can’t be ignored: New York has some of the strictest gun laws in the country. Even though the gun was legally registered to the store, prosecutors are arguing it’s a little murky how Cordero got his hands on it.

The fact that he found it in the bathroom is a little weird, right? It wasn’t like the gun was right there in front of him. Was it a last-minute decision to grab the gun, or did he already know it was there?

Now, if you ask some people, they’ll argue that Cordero was completely justified. He didn’t know how dangerous these robbers were. One of them had a gun, and in those moments, you have to act fast. You can’t just stand there and hope the cops show up in time. It’s not like the movies where you have all the time in the world to think things through. If your life's on the line, you do what you need to do.

This situation is the perfect example of why gun laws and self-defense rights can be so tricky. 

And, of course, there’s the fact that this is a bodega we’re talking about. Bodegas are more than just stores. They’re more like a community hub. For many people, the person behind the counter isn’t just a shopkeeper as much as they are a neighbor or a friend. 

But the law doesn’t always care about the human side of things. In Cordero’s case, the police are looking at this through a legal lens, and they’re not letting him off the hook just because he was scared. He’s facing charges for using a weapon in a way that might not have been strictly necessary, according to the law.

And while we’re on the subject of guns, there’s another important point to consider here: self-defense ammunition. Many gun owners make sure their firearms are loaded with the right ammo for self-defense (specifically, hollow-point rounds, which are designed to stop a threat more efficiently by expanding upon impact).

These types of rounds are the better choice for self-defense because they’re less likely to over-penetrate and harm innocent bystanders. It’s a small but critical detail in cases like this. Cordero might have been better off ensuring he was using self-defense ammunition. Which is something designed to minimize collateral damage while giving him a higher chance of stopping the threat immediately. 

While we don’t know exactly what kind of ammunition he had, it’s a good reminder for all gun owners to carefully consider not just their weapons, but also the ammo they use when they’re thinking about personal protection.

The bigger question, though, is what this case says about our society’s relationship with guns and self-defense. So, what happens next? It’s hard to say. Cordero’s fate is still up in the air, and we’ll have to wait and see how the courts handle the case. 

But one thing’s for sure: this situation is going to keep people talking about self-defense and what it means to truly protect yourself.