nalioth said:
Open carry deters Waffle House robbers
VCDL Board Member Foils Bank Robbery By Open Carry - THR
Amazing use of a 1875 Remington Army .45 Long Colt - THR
Just a few.
Now please show us situations where the open carrier got whacked first. . .
Your citations are much like those available from Michigan Open Carry - they collect those events that support only their point of view, which makes perfect sense. Since I don't oppose the right to open carry - in fact, I support it - I don't collect incident reports in opposition. I have no intention of providing ammunition to those opposed to open carry, so even if I had such information I wouldn't do so.
I simply rely on what I believe I would do in a similar situation. It just makes sense to me that if I were intent on using a firearm to rob someone or someplace, I'd identify threats and plan to nullify them - in other words, if I saw someone carrying a gun, I'd shoot him first. It's true that some miscreants would back off, but others wouldn't and it's those who won't that pose a real threat. To say, as I infer from your statement, that none of those braver BG's exist and that the mere sighting of a gun is enough to always cause the bad guy to flee seems to me illogical, so why give them the advantage when they are present?
If the better argument is determined by who can post the most media and blog reports, I will concede. But can you really be certain that all the bad guys react as claimed in a collection of clippings from an organization with a specific view point?
Edit: Originally I wasn't going to get into the cases you cited, feeling that the old, 'I can post more stories than you can' issue was more important to address. But, in retrospect I feel it's important to at least point out that there's another side to consider in each case.
First, the Waffle House in Georgia: when confronted by the police, the BG's in the car said they were waiting to rob the restaurant but changed their minds upon finding out that some customers were armed. Maybe that's true. And it's also possible that they told the cops that simply to avoid prosecution for attempted armed robbery. Am I to believe that armed robbers suddenly become completely honest about their intentions when confronted by law enforcement?
Second, the VCDL member in his bank: the robber came in, looked around the bank and then fled. It's speculation that he changed his mind because of the VDCL member's open carry of his 1911. We don't even know if he actually saw the gun. And if you read the entire thread, post #22 contains a description of a situation where the person carrying openly did not deter the assault, and was in fact the target of the assault. True, he was not shot, but he was targeted; the robber chose to disarm him instead, but can you count on all BG's making that decision? I think not.
Finally, the 1875 Remington: A robber enters a store and immediately shoots the store owner/clerk; he's eventually mortally wounded by a citizen who happens to be open carrying. Again, there's no evidence the BG saw the citizen's gun but chose to attack the store owner first. I maintain that he (the BG) made the assumption the owner might have a gun behind the counter and chose to neutralize that probable threat without knowing about the citizen's gun. In fact, the evidence is clear that he was not aware of the citizen's gun because he (the BG) did not react to the citizen until after the citizen had drawn and confronted the BG. I maintain that if the BG had been aware of the citizen's gun, he (the BG) would have shot him (the citizen) first because he was the more immediate threat; it was only speculation that caused him to shoot the store owner. In this case the open carry simply wasn't a factor one way or the other, as the BG wasn't aware of it.
So your three citations make no case for open carry that I can see. Again, I'm all in favor of the right to carry, openly or concealed. But you make your choices based on common sense, and it's just common sense to me that if you encounter a BG that's going to shoot, the person posing the biggest threat is going to be the first target. I don't for a minute claim that the sight of an armed citizen will not deter many would-be robbers, but there are certainly many who will press ahead and make that citizen their first victim. If you don't mind, I'll just choose not to make myself that target.
