Mugger Defense at Fairhaven’s Karate Quest Packs Punch

On November 7 an instructor at Fairhaven’s Karate Quest taught participants of a mugger defense class how to physically defend themselves from attackers.

The class agenda included what an individual should do if they are held with a knife to their throat from behind and how an individual can push an attacker away if they’re pinned to the ground.

Cecil Jentges, the instructor for the course and director of Karate Quest in Fairhaven, demonstrated the step-by-step processes that an individual can utilize to get out of an attacker’s grip or distance oneself from an attacker. He said that the point at which a person must choose to physically defend themselves depends on the importance of what the attacker wants from them. According to Jentges, an attacker will usually ask their target for at least one of three things: their items, their body or their life.

“[Karate] isn’t about tournaments, it’s about basic skills and life saving,” said Mick Jolly, creator of Karate Quest and former Secret Service agent who teaches self defense classes at Western Washington University’s Recreation Center.

According to Western’s Annual Security and Fire Safety Report, there were five counts of forcible sex offenses, four counts of aggravated assault, and three counts of simple assault on the University’s campus in 2012.

“Someone coming in to our classes not knowing anything will now have some basic skills with which they can defend themselves,” said Mick Jolly

Jolly, 46, started training in the martial arts when he was 7 years old. He created the first Karate Quest six years ago in Ferndale, Washington, when he decided he wanted to stop being an agent at the Secret Service and spend more time with his family. A second Karate Quest in Fairhaven was opened a little over a year ago and has since attracted around 200 students.

Jentges started training in martial arts when he was 13 years old and has since learned many different styles, including Kajukenbo, Kenpo, the Premier System, MMA, and Jujitsu.

“This job isn’t the thing you do to become a millionaire,” Jentges said. “[Martial arts] is a physical way for people to overcome fear.”

Karate Quest provides mugger defense classes and women’s self defense classes monthly and offers weekly classes for all ages.  The mugger defense class usually attracts between two to five people and the women’s self defense classes can have over 20 attendees. There is also an advanced mugger defense course offered that is five hours long in which there is more one-on-one defense training and a wider variety of techniques taught.

Along with the mugger defense and women’s self defense classes, Karate Quest teaches defense techniques involving pepper spray and firearms.

According to Jentges, it is smartest for a person to physically defend themselves if an attacker asks for more than their items. If a person can get out of a situation by handing over their belongings, he said, it’s safer for them and may actually save them money. “You’d have to go to a doctor to fix that hand you hurt by punching someone, so you could lose as much money fixing yourself as you would handing your money over,” he said.