LEO and CCW/private citizen gun ownership

[brj3car]

I have had two separate experiences in talking with LEO about private gun ownership and in both cases the LEO's seemed to approve. I have, however, noticed several threads here and on other boards regarding CCW permits, for example with a traffic stop, where the LEO may have been uncomfortable with a citizen legally carrying a weapon.

Obviously, there is a huge difference between the two. Aside from that, I would like to know if there is any kind of general consensus from LEO's concerning CCW.

 

[Dbl0Kevin]

LEO's are only people. Each and every one is going to hold his or her own view. As far as general consensus goes I've seen surveys that show upwards of 66% support law abiding citizens right to own and carry guns. The reason it doesn't show more often is because the ones at the top are not really LEO's but are politicians and they do not represent the average LEO.

 

[stdlrf11]

In theory, LEOs approve of gun ownership, but in situations such as traffic stops, they want to be the only ones with a gun. It makes their job safer.

I firmly believe that every law abiding citizen should be armed at all times, but when I confront someone on a darkened street, I don't want them to even have a pocketknife, let alone a gun.

I don't know who you are or anything about you, so until we're done, I'll take your gun and put it away until the stop is over. Don't let this discourage you from carrying. If you are legal, you are okay. Cops are trained to think of all guns as dangerous, regardless of whose hands they are in.

stdlrf11

 

[pax]

In theory, most police support private citizen CCW.

In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice.

In practice, there is.

pax

 

[Majic]

LEOs are not only individuals, but they come from all across this country and opinions vary widely from area to area. You should consider that some areas have allowed open and concealed carrying for as long as anyone can remember so no thought is given to it while other areas have just received the oportunity and some are still not sure about the concept.

 

[brj3car]

All good responses....stdlrf11, I respect your position on this issue.

 

[Otherguy Overby]

Double standard?

stdlrf11:
In theory, LEOs approve of gun ownership, but in situations such as traffic stops, they want to be the only ones with a gun. It makes their job safer.

Okay let's suppose here: You stop a vehicle from another county, you don't know the driver by sight. He turns out to be an off duty cop.

Do you also disarm him?

 

[sacp81170a]

I've gotten mixed opinions from within my own department. A majority of our officers are in favor of CCW, heck, my chief is a CCW instructor. One or two are ambivalent on the subject of CCW but they're generally OK with people owning firearms. But then, I'm in the rural (but rapidly becoming urban) South.

I'm strongly in favor of CCW. In the case of the off duty cop from another county, if he's carrying ID, I *do not* disarm him unless I have a compelling reason to do so. But then, when it's a CCW holder, I *do not* disarm him either unless I have a compelling reason. We're both much safer if a loaded weapon stays where it belongs when not being used, in the holster.

 

[Euclidean]

The only part about this that really boils my bum is I'll hear from the LE community : "Well it's nothing personal it's just officer safety." What they're really saying is "You plan to shoot me, obviously. I am going to prevent that."

Consider the following statement then:

In that case, I will confiscate the sidearm of any LE personnel in my immediate vicinity for civilian safety.

Insulting isn't it? Anyone who reads that should be infuriated anyone would have such a horrible attitude. The likelihood that any LE personnel would just open fire on the public for no good reason is abyssmal.

Yet it's perfectly acceptable for the LE community to have this attitude regarding me as a threat to their safety. I'm not a threat to your safety, I'm making your job easier by fending for myself so you can pay better attention to the people who can't or won't! I don't expect a cookie or a medal either, I just want to be left to my own devices.

That's why I am infuriated at the idea a peace officer has the right to disarm me when no crime has occurred. That's why I'm infuriated I go to jail if the first words out of my mouth aren't "Hello officer I have a concealed handgun license." Is that the most important characteristic I have to the LE community? They don't care what my name is or what I do for a living so much as they care about whether I have a handgun permit or not apparently.

Yeah, that's why I jumped through all the hoops to get CCW and lawfully owned firearms, I want to be an evil maniacal killer. Criminy.

 

[mmike87]

I think it's safe to say most LEO's on this forum are probably pro-CCW.

It's the LEO's that are shooters and are not members of this and other forums that I worry about.

It is ridiculous that in some states the laws are open to interpretation to the individual LEO's - and a simple misstatement during a stop can end up with you in cuffs.

No one who is not commiting a crime should EVER have to worry about LEO's. The PROBLEM is that so many things are crimes these days that it's likely that every single one of us has already technically committed a crime today, of some sort - without even knowing it.

 

[Ala Dan]

As a former 20+ year veteran former LEO

I hereby approve gun ownership by private individuals. If you meet all
of the criteria as set forth by the federal, state, county, and city
govenrment; I have NO quarms with anyone owning a firearm. And,
actually in todays society I strongly encourage it~!

 

[espanola]

The statements about LEOs being human and having as many opinions as there are LEOs would be accurate. Geography will have something to do with it as well. The huge majority that I've known were pro-CCW.
I've been fortunate to live primarily in gun friendly areas and have had no problem. Two times stopped for traffic issues (ok, speeding) while carrying--when I informed the officer I was carrying I wasn't asked to empty it, or anything. One time the officer just looked at my like "So?" Surprised me a little.
One time I caught a prowler at my place and held him at gun point. As the officer arrived, but before they could see me, I yelled "I'm the homeowner and I'm armed!" (I expect they'd been forwarned by the dispatcher.) All they told me was "Please put the gun away sir."
No problems at all. Of course, all instances were in rural areas in gun friendly states.

 

[cyanide]

I think a lot of LEO opinion depends on whether they are rural officers of the law or big city officers.

The rural officers seem to be more accepting of CCW while the big city officers seem to think they should only be armed ?

Least that has been my expierence with fellow LEO's.

 

[stdlrf11]

There is a difference between traffic stops and other encounters. If you're giving a guy a ticket, it is a waste of time, and yes, an insult, to disarm him.

cyanide, you seem to be onto something here. I'm from the country, and most of my co-workers are from the city. They have different views on CCW. I think it has to do with the rural officer having more experience with guns. In the city, you have to go through a lot of hassles to shoot, such as driving to the range and shooting amongst strangers. In the country, you go out back with a buddy and set up some tin cans.

In the country, almost everyone has some kind of gun on them. Cops know that and are more comfortable around them.

stdlrf11

 

[Double Naught Spy]

There is a difference between traffic stops and other encounters. If you're giving a guy a ticket, it is a waste of time, and yes, an insult, to disarm him.

If you feel insulted because a LEO legally disarmed you during a "normal" traffic stop then you apparently consider your feelings more important than the officer feels about his own safety. Do you also feel the same way if the officer has you exit your vehicle and sit in his/her vehicle?

I also think your feelings are probably the wrong ones you should be feeling. If the officer feels unsafe with you having a gun, then maybe you should be more concerned about why the officer has such feelings. What circumstance has brought the officer to feel the need to disarm. Is it just a personal bias against guns? Is it a fear of guns? Is it because something has happened sometime in the very recent past and you fit the description of the bad guy and so the officer feels there is the possibility that you pose an actual threat to him/her?

For the first of threse three isn't much you can do about it. If the last two, then maybe you should be very concerned for your own safety, but the problem is, you don't know the officer's motivation for disarming you.

 

[bubbaturbo]

Not trying to be smart-alecky but keep in mind that legal activities don't require the approval of anyone and opinions of those who approve or disapprove are irrelevant until it comes time to vote. These days you can find somebody who is against everything you might want to do, whether it's drive an SUV, send your kids to a private school, keep your own money, smoke a cigarette, eat a Big Mac or even breathe.

 

[mljdeckard]

I don't get pulled over often, but the common concensus among the police I talk to is, CCW holders have already proven that they are not criminals. This is a good thing.

BUT,

Imagine this. As a traffic cop in any of a variety of environments, you are going to pull over many thousands of cars through the course of your career. Some UHP guys might pull someone over 50 miles from backup. Every single time they approach the vehicle, there is the chance that the door will open, and someone will shoot back at them. They will pull over cars smuggling drugs, drivers with arrest warrants, people under the influence. Every single traffic stop is potentially deadly. If a cop doesn't want to become a statistic, they must take every possible precaution. I cannot fault them for that. Almost always, when I have ID'd myself as a CCW holder, they don't worry about it. I'm not the one they are worried about confronting.

 

[Soybomb]

The only part about this that really boils my bum is I'll hear from the LE community : "Well it's nothing personal it's just officer safety." What they're really saying is "You plan to shoot me, obviously. I am going to prevent that."

Would you feel equally insulted if the officer asked you to turn off your car's engine? That clearly implies that they think you're going to run away or run them over. While I'm a little disconcerted at the thought of someone who isn't familiar with the gun taking it out of the holster, I recognize it is indeed to protect themselves.

For some reason people seem to always wind up thinking police are gun people who are going to be firearm hobbyists and proponents of concealed carry. For many of them the gun is just a job requirement and it doesn't go past that very far.

 

[ilbob]

I have considerable sympathy for cops in remote situations far from help. It is understandable they would be cautious. The one in a million incident where someone jumps out of a car and starts blasting away does happen now and then.

I am not sure that is justification for treating every person that is stopped the same way you would treat a violent criminal. It appears to me that the massive application of force and the attempt to "control" the encounters with normal law abiding citizens have not helped LE gain the trust of the average citizen. And I am not all that sure it has made much difference in their encounters with criminals.

 

[CAPTAIN MIKE]

CCW Permit Holders are 'Certified Good Guys'

To obtain a CCW permit, one typically has to pass a criminal background check in addition to the training and documentation requirements. Once shown to not be a convicted felon, most states will issue the CCW permit.

Criminals, by nature, don't "bother" with such things. They carry illegally whereas we carry legally. However, when first approaching your vehicle, an LEO has no idea exactly who's inside and what their intentions are.

Officers are trained to keep "Officer Safety" clearly in mind -- and they have all seen dashboard camera footage in the Academy of what happens in traffic stop shootings. But if you follow some common-sense protocol, the stop should go fine and end without negative incident.

Here's my two cents:

# 1. Keep your hands in plain sight - the 10 o'clock and 2 o'clock if best.
# 2. Be polite and friendly. "Yes Ma'am" or "Yes Sir" denotes respect.
# 3. When asked for your license and registration, my suggestion is that if yours aren't already out and available, you should notify the officer as to the location of your registration, your driver's license and your CCW permit, and the location of your sidearm -- all while keeping your hands in plain site. Once you've done that -- just ask the officer how he or she wants to handle it from there, and follow their instructions.

It would be JUST PLAIN DUMB to say such things as "I have a GUN in the car" or "My gun's right here" are you reach towards it. If you're going to refer to your firearm verball, my suggestion is to NOT refer to it as a "Gun" but rather a "Sidearm", which is somehow less worriesome to the officer and is more in line with the language the officer uses professionally in referring to the tool on his or her strong side hip.

Once you identify yourself as a CCW permit holder ('certified non-criminal citizen'), you are immediately and effectively reducing the officer's 'safety concerns' and are establishing a positive identity that will likely be trusted once your status is verified. The officers I have encountered have never spread-eagled me on the pavement or even disarmed me. They merely asked that I keep my hands in plain sight and not make any sudden moves. All three have said something to the effect of "Thanks for letting me know that".

To summarize: Put yourself in the officer's place; Use common-sense and courtesy at all times; Let the officer take the lead; and as you drive away from the scene (hopefully without a ticket), remember that you have made an impression as a CCW permit holder --- for the better or for the worse -- and that your enounter will likely be repeated to the officer's comrades back at the station as the watch changes from one shift to another.

 

[stevelyn]

Not only do I approve, I try and promote it.

+1 on Capt. Mike's "Concealed Carry Protocol for the Armed Citizen".

 

[evan price]

Personally, my opinion here, a lot more cops would be a lot more at ease with CCW holders, if certain CCW holders stopped acting like the CCW was a Junior PD license. At least, so far as my experiences go, there are a lot of people I have met who CCW and talk about what they HOPE HAPPENS SOMEDAY and what they will do IF IT HAPPENED...and it seems like every firearms class I sit in on there's that one dude who always wants to know when he can shoot somebody...:banghead:
And as far as a CCW license being a "Certified Good Guy" card. Well. That's like to saying, if you have a Commercial Driver's License, you no longer have to worry about vehicle inspections or speeding tickets.

 

[geekWithA.45]

They're basically all over the map.

All of the rank and file surveys I've seen indicate that your basic, garden variety cop in most states that are used to armed citizens vastly support rkba and ccw. Cops from blue bastions tend not to, mostly because they're so unused to the idea.

By and large, my understanding is that due to the historically law abiding nature of carry permit holders, the permit tends to put most reasonable officers at ease rather than on alert.

As for the issue of disarming citizens for "officer's safety", the jury is out for me.

In general, I want to preserve the this _option_ for LEO's to be able to act on just cause, intuition, or something that doesn't smell right.

HOWEVER, this does not justify a standard operating procedure of automatically disarming every citizen they come into contact with.

Disarming someone is _inherently_ a sign of mistrust, _ought_ to be considered at least a mild insult, and its important for society as a whole _never_ be comfortable and fully accepting of the ritual prostration before authority that is the message behind automatically disarming.

We are citizens, full equals with all others before the law.

Institutionalizing mistrust of citizens drives a wedge between the public, and the publics servants, and creates a layered system of privileged knights and subservient serfs that is rightly repugnant to our American sensibilities.

 

[the pistolero]

there are a lot of people I have met who CCW and talk about what they HOPE HAPPENS SOMEDAY and what they will do IF IT HAPPENED

Yikes. Just...yikes. Call me crazy, but I just can't imagine hoping that my home ever gets broken into, some crazed lunatic crashes his truck into the restaurant at which I am dining a la George Hennard and starts shooting, or something like that. I don't doubt there are people like that out there, but that's just frightening. Talk about giving gunnies a bad rep...

 

[ilbob]

Institutionalizing mistrust of citizens drives a wedge between the public, and the publics servants, and creates a layered system of privileged knights and subservient serfs that is rightly repugnant to our American sensibilities.

Thats true, and sadly in many cases LE agencies have alienated the very people that you might at first glance think would be their most fervent supporters. Much of it is driven by political expediency, and we all know who is really responsible for that problem.

The law abiding citizen has to feel like LE is protecting them, and not just out to "get" them for anything they can. The pervasive use of traffic enforcement for revenue generation, the increased criminalization of more or less victimless crimes, and the routine use of force far beyond what is really necessary, are things that just don't help make the average citizen feel all warm and fuzzy about LE.

There are a lot of basically law abiding people, right or wrong, who are more afraid of LE than they are of criminals. If you don't believe that, think about it the next time you see a cop in your rear view mirror. I'd bet your first instinct is to take your foot off the gas, whether you are speeding or not.