Posted on 12/13/2007 6:45:42 PM PST by neverdem
At issue: A woman using a handgun to stop a killer in a “soft target,” a church.
Our view: The case shows why Michigan school staff need an option for training and concealed carry, not “gun-free zones.”
Another month has brought more shooting sprees in what commonly are “gun-free zones.” Four died in two separate shootings Sunday in Colorado. Eight were murdered last Wednesday in an Omaha, Neb., shopping mall. Seven students were slain recently in Finland. That followed a Cleveland school shooting in October.
Only in the latest attack did an adult have a right to a gun to defend herself and others. And that attack Sunday at a crowded Colorado church ended abruptly when citizen volunteer Jeanne Assam used her handgun to stop the killer before he could murder dozens of other innocent people.
“When the shots were fired, she rushed toward the scene and encountered the attacker there in a hallway. He never got more than 50 feet inside our building,” senior pastor Brady Boyd told reporters. “There could have been a great loss of life yesterday, and she probably saved over 100 lives.”
But if a similar killer entered a Michigan school, even a former police officer such as Assam could not legally protect students with her firearm. That’s because Michigan unwisely made schools gun-free zones except for active-duty law enforcement, which basically means that mass murderers can rest assured law-abiding staff are unarmed. Time and again we see how intermediate steps such as counseling or unarmed guards fail to stop killers such as Cho Seung-hui (Virginia Tech), Jeff Weise (Red Lake, Minn.) or others. Rather than discourage psychopaths, gun-free zones assist their quests for high body counts and ill-deserved fame.
Michigan House Bill 5162 would give law-abiding adults who pass background checks and concealed weapons training a choice to protect their students, if their district approves. Private citizens saving lives by using firearms to stop killers have been documented in case after case — a high school in Pearl, Miss., a college at Appalachian School of Law and now a church in Colorado. In each case, the arguments raised by opponents against concealed carry laws were shown to be hollow. The citizen’s firearm was not taken away by an attacker, the scene did not become a free-fire zone and the citizen did not accidentally hit innocent bystanders.
Survivors are asking how many victims might have been saved if the Omaha shopping mall had not banned firearms, which are legal elsewhere in Nebraska. If officials cannot keep victims safe — and will not allow them to protect themselves — then some believe those officials ought to be held liable in lawsuits for violating the victims’ true “equal protection” rights. Gun-free zone liability acts have been introduced in Georgia and Arizona, and are being considered in other states.
Must a score of Michigan school children end up victims before House Bill 5162 receives a House Judiciary Committee hearing? We would much prefer to see the headline “Hero saves 100,” than “Lawmaker: ‘I never thought it could happen here.’ ”
Might have better luck with civil lawsuits- failure to provide adequate security.
And end up with a cop on every corner, observation camera's on every street, or UAV's flying overhead? No thanks...
“He praised Ms. Assam’s coolness and courage under fire.”
I heard him talking about it on Monday morning. He did indeed praise her and call her a heroine. He talked about how she just kept on walking straight towards the gunman and as she did she continued to fire. He said he had never seen such courage,and then he added “and I was in Vietnam”.
You might want to rethink that. I believe the one that dropped the perp had one. Albeit in a different location. :)
"If I shoot, what's gonna happen to me? If I don't shoot, what's gonna happen to me?"
May never have fired their weapons except at a range.
. . . but that being the case, they are in the wrong business.
I should think those two jokers will have to change their names and leave town.
Psalm 23:4 (King James Version)
King James Version (KJV)
4Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
I was thinking the same thing.
This makes them directly and uniquely culpable.
MI ping.
normally i complain that our legislatures keep passing bills before they finish with all the budget bills... but this is one that’s more important.
I believe it's not a matter of "if", but "when", terrorists attack a school here. That whackjob at Virginia Tech already showed how easy it would be.
If you would like to be added or dropped from the Michigan ping list, please freepmail me.
I completely agree, abs0--important, necessary. For whatever reason, I've had this feeling that MI schools are a ticking bomb for this kind of preventable massacre. I just don't think our legislature has the brass ones needed to do anything about it.
In Missouri we have both.
This is why MSM started up that inane babble about the perp offing himself. Can’t have any suggestion that armed citizens are any good for anything.
My church meets in a school as well. As I understand it, on Sundays, when we are the tenant, being a church overrides it being a school.
Thanks neverdem.
No, I think the writer meant that once those civil suits begin the states and local authorities may tend to relent on allowing guns in schools etc., rather than pay out more for UAVs and cameras on the street corners.
If anyone in my family is ever killed or injured in a “gun free” zone, you can bet your ass I’ll file a massive lawsuit against the state, and probably feds for disallowing (assuming it is a school zone) weapons on citizens.
An Armed citizen with a gun, is better than a cell phone and 911...
No, just allow me to provide my own. If and when I am disallowed to provide my own CCW, then the agency (retail establishment, concert, airport- whatever) is then responsible for my security.
Trust me, the fear of lawsuits is a great motivational "stick", in many cases moreso that fear of prosecution for breaking a law. Many management decisions are made with civil lawsuit avoidance at the forefront of the decision-making process, as opposed to complying with a public law.
Nothing against vaginas per se. Many of my very favorite people have them, and I’m grateful. It’s just that the colloquial for the organ is a moniker that might fit these two to a tee. The actual heroine, in contrast, did hers proud.
Just like in Israel.
There are as many school shootings in Israel as there are shootings at the average shooting range, none.
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