El Tejon
Member
From the Journal & Courier, Lafayette, Indiana: news from the nationwide campus gun ban protest. Got to love the moronic comments from the former State Policeman. How to tell the difference? Well, gee, how do your highly trained officers tell the difference in the grocery store, movie theater, sidewalk, etc., Johnny?
It is as if someone gave him a script to read and he read it without thinking.
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http://www.jconline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080423/NEWS05/804230355
Students protest concealed weapons laws
By ERIC WEDDLE • [email protected] • April 23, 2008
If Chris Jewell carried a gun on the Ivy Tech Community College Lafayette campus, it would be a .40 caliber Smith & Wesson.
"My shirt covers it when holstered," he said. "You never know it is there unless, God forbid, it had to be used."
Jewell, a criminal justice sophomore, is part of a 28,500-member national organization called Students for Concealed Carry on Campus. This week members are wearing empty gun holsters to class at 125 colleges, including Ivy Tech, in an attempt to draw attention to university policies and state laws that prevent licensed gun owners from being armed on campus.
Indiana law grants Ivy Tech and Purdue University the power to prohibit guns from their property -- a policy that neither school plans to change, according to each school's spokesman. While about 15 Ivy Tech students are actively taking part in this week's protest, not all students want that policy to change.
"I think it is unneeded and could cause potential liability," Gabriel Valtierra, an Ivy Tech sophomore, said. "I wouldn't feel safe knowing that other people have guns on campus."
Valtierra said he and other friends have a comfortable sense of safety at campus, but it would be upset of students could carry guns.
Reassuring students that concealed carry would increase safety and not be a distraction is what Jewell wants to accomplish this week.
"This is an education-based goal, to share with people what the policies are and that everyone has the right to self-defense," he said.
An off-duty, armed Lafayette Police Department officer patrols Ivy Tech most of the day every day, along with unarmed security officers, said Tom McCool, campus spokesman.
John Mishler, an Ivy Tech criminal justice instructor and retired 34-year Indiana State Police officer, sees many sides to the issue.
"As a citizen, I want that right," he said. "But as an instructor or law enforcement officer, I have a problem with people carrying guns."
If anyone could carry a firearm on campus, Mishler said, how would police separate legally licensed students from an assailant?
But Andrew Lowe, a Purdue University senior, favors licensed students having the choice to carry, especially after shootings at Northern Illinois University and Virginia Tech.
"One, I do have the right," he said. "Second, it is really the only effective means of protecting yourself on campus. The police can't. In the recent campus shootings the police arrived after the shootings were over."
As part of the protest, Joaquin Orozco, an Ivy Tech freshman, wore a black holster Tuesday reserved for his Glock 22 when he is not in class or work.
"You can't secure everything and everyone," he said. "But I want to secure myself. It is my right, and I want that extra security."
In Indiana, people over 18 can apply for a permit to carry a handgun, said Gloria Andrews, Tippecanoe County Sheriff's Department's firearms clerk. They must be 21 to purchase the gun, however.
A four-year permit costs $40, and a lifetime permit is $125 if the applicant passes a background check, she said.
It is as if someone gave him a script to read and he read it without thinking.
**********************************************************
http://www.jconline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080423/NEWS05/804230355
Students protest concealed weapons laws
By ERIC WEDDLE • [email protected] • April 23, 2008
If Chris Jewell carried a gun on the Ivy Tech Community College Lafayette campus, it would be a .40 caliber Smith & Wesson.
"My shirt covers it when holstered," he said. "You never know it is there unless, God forbid, it had to be used."
Jewell, a criminal justice sophomore, is part of a 28,500-member national organization called Students for Concealed Carry on Campus. This week members are wearing empty gun holsters to class at 125 colleges, including Ivy Tech, in an attempt to draw attention to university policies and state laws that prevent licensed gun owners from being armed on campus.
Indiana law grants Ivy Tech and Purdue University the power to prohibit guns from their property -- a policy that neither school plans to change, according to each school's spokesman. While about 15 Ivy Tech students are actively taking part in this week's protest, not all students want that policy to change.
"I think it is unneeded and could cause potential liability," Gabriel Valtierra, an Ivy Tech sophomore, said. "I wouldn't feel safe knowing that other people have guns on campus."
Valtierra said he and other friends have a comfortable sense of safety at campus, but it would be upset of students could carry guns.
Reassuring students that concealed carry would increase safety and not be a distraction is what Jewell wants to accomplish this week.
"This is an education-based goal, to share with people what the policies are and that everyone has the right to self-defense," he said.
An off-duty, armed Lafayette Police Department officer patrols Ivy Tech most of the day every day, along with unarmed security officers, said Tom McCool, campus spokesman.
John Mishler, an Ivy Tech criminal justice instructor and retired 34-year Indiana State Police officer, sees many sides to the issue.
"As a citizen, I want that right," he said. "But as an instructor or law enforcement officer, I have a problem with people carrying guns."
If anyone could carry a firearm on campus, Mishler said, how would police separate legally licensed students from an assailant?
But Andrew Lowe, a Purdue University senior, favors licensed students having the choice to carry, especially after shootings at Northern Illinois University and Virginia Tech.
"One, I do have the right," he said. "Second, it is really the only effective means of protecting yourself on campus. The police can't. In the recent campus shootings the police arrived after the shootings were over."
As part of the protest, Joaquin Orozco, an Ivy Tech freshman, wore a black holster Tuesday reserved for his Glock 22 when he is not in class or work.
"You can't secure everything and everyone," he said. "But I want to secure myself. It is my right, and I want that extra security."
In Indiana, people over 18 can apply for a permit to carry a handgun, said Gloria Andrews, Tippecanoe County Sheriff's Department's firearms clerk. They must be 21 to purchase the gun, however.
A four-year permit costs $40, and a lifetime permit is $125 if the applicant passes a background check, she said.
