Why I wish concealed carry was legal on college campuses

[Marswolf]

Let me bring up another case. About midnight in April 2002, James Norwood walked to his car in the parking lot at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City. Two men approached him, forced him into the back seat of his car and eventually strangled him to death. They took the car because they wanted it for a bank robbery.

But this case has problems too. First, Norwood was only 19. Second, the assailants pretended to be undercover officers and patted down Norwood before forcing him into the back seat of the car.

The details are pretty interesting and can be found in one of the assailant's appeal in the 6th Circuit.

http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/05a0729n-06.pdf

In all honesty, I don't think legal campus carry would help the students that much in situations like this where you have individual confrontations. First, you have to be 21. Then you have to take the carry class and wait for the permit. Then you have the problem of people pretending to be undercover cops. You draw a gun on a real undercover cop and you are likely to have them mopping your blood up off of the pavement.

Where it might make a difference is in situations like Virginia Tech. It seems to me that such situations are the proper argument for student campus carry. But I see no reason to not allow everyone with a permit to carry on school campuses. As it is now, such prohibition doesn't keep the bad guy shooters out of any school. It only prevents the good guys from having a gun when they might be able to eliminate a threat.

Restrictions on good citizen carry make no logical sense. Schools, restaurants, bars - anywhere without metal detectors - only hamper good people, preventing their help in eliminating bad people.

[Fallguy]

I know if I am in Walmart or walking down the street I can use my weapon to protect myself or others, but what if you are in a posted area? Ok so if you are carrying in Ruby Tuesdays, remember it's illegal, and use your weapon to defend self or other you are going to go to jail. Likewise if you are on a school campus.

Correct..or am I missing something?

I guess a campus parking lot could be a grey area?

After all you could just be driving by.

Incorrect....you are missing 39-17-1322..... it says that if you use your weapon in self-defense or defense of another you can not be charged with a violation of any 39-17-13xx law.

[Guest Ranger Rick]

We get police alerts about stuff that happens in and around campus here at UT Knoxville... all the time.

Example...

Aug. 2, 2008

To: Knoxville-area UT Students, Faculty and Staff

From: UT Police

Subject: Robbery near Sutherland Village Apartments late Friday

The Knoxville Police Department is investigating a robbery that occurred near the Sutherland Village Apartments on Lebanon Street at about 11:30 p.m. Friday.

The victim, a UT student who was not injured, reported an unidentified man took her purse while she was walking toward the UT-owned Sutherland Village Apartments that are located on Sutherland Avenue several miles from campus.

The victim described the suspect as a black male between 20 and 25 years old, about 6-foot-2 and 220 pounds and wearing long black shorts, a black T-shirt and black ball cap. He was accompanied by another suspect the victim described as a white male between 20 and

25 years old, about 6-feet and 175 pounds with short brown hair and wearing blue jeans, a white T-shirt with blue or green writing on it.

This and other e-mail notifications are intended to raise awareness about criminal activity on or near UT property and in areas frequented by faculty, staff and students.

Anyone with information concerning this incident should contact Knoxville Police at (865) 215-7000 or UTPD at (865) 974-3114.

UT Police urge all members of the campus community to avoid walking alone at night and to contact them any time they need assistance or notice anything suspicious.

For more information and a list of safety tips, go to the UT Police Web site at http://web.utk.edu/~utpolice/ or http://safety.utk.edu/.

People (students, staff, faculty) that can qualify for an HCP should be able to carry in, on and around campus. Making these hugh areas "gun free" does nothing but invite trouble. Many of these twirps travel from various areas in the county down to the campus area simply because they know its easy pickens. It makes me sick to think about it!

[Guest coldblackwind]

I think what the OP was trying to get across is that he is upset that he may be faced with some knife wielding coed, or worse, and not have the means to protect himself. -Brasilnuts

Precisely.

[Im Neero]

At the University of Memphis there are regularly armed robberies on campus. In those situations I think concealed carry could help.

[fizik]

At the University of Memphis there are regularly armed robberies on campus. In those situations I think concealed carry could help.

true. I spent two years there, living on campus. I was across the street when the rapist from New York who raped a woman dressed a a fireman (I can't think of his name, surely someone remembers it) was confronted by a UofM cop and stabbed himself in the neck - not 100 yards from the Richardson Towers dorms. Right up the street by one block full of frat houses, going over toward the local Scootie's convenience store, a guy was running around with a sawed off shotgun robbing people. Stabbings, rapes, thugs running around campus from Orange Mound - it's epidemic.Responsible, legal carry would certainly be appropriate. I had to leave my guns stored at the campus police station, doing no good at all.