Amputee uses crutch to fight off man with gun

AURORA, Colo. -- An amputee who discovered a burglar inside his home was shot while fighting him off with a crutch.

Roger Baxter survived the Tuesday incident after a cell phone apparently slowed a bullet to his chest.

"I just got it programmed," Baxter said of the phone.

Baxter lost his right leg after being hit by a tractor-trailer in October. He was returning from getting a haircut when he discovered the man with a gun inside his house.

"He was pointing it at me," Baxter told KDVR-TV. "He kept coming toward me and he got within 5 foot of me and that's when I hauled off and hit him with one of my crutches."

Aurora police spokesman Robert Friel said Baxter was wounded in the upper torso after the bullet hit the phone.

Friel said two juveniles were arrested, one believed to be the suspect in the attack and the other believed to have been a lookout.

"It's not my time," said Baxter, a Vietnam veteran. "I went head to head against a semi back in October and today I went up against a 9 mm and I'm here. I'm just a tough old bird."