Gun Free Zones: Who is liable? – VIDEO

Alan Korwin discusses Gun Free Zone liability at the 2016 Gun Rights Policy Conference.
Alan Korwin discusses Gun Free Zone liability at the 2016 Gun Rights Policy Conference.
Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership
Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership

USA –  -(Ammoland.com)- Tennessee Senator Dolores Gresham recently introduced Senate Bill 1736 which would establish that “if the person or entity posts to prohibit the possession of firearms on the property, the posting entity, for purposes of liability, assumes custodial responsibility for the security and defense of any concealed handgun permit holder harmed while on the posted property.” 

This is not a new concept. Arizona has had several bills introduced since 2002.

The Defenseless Victim Act of 2002 (HB 2456) was the first. Subsequent bills in Arizona (HB 2320), Georgia (HB 31), Kansas (HB 2353) and Illinois (SB 0048) have not yet made it into law.

However, under Wisconsin’s Concealed Carry Act, property owners are immune to liability if they allow concealed carry on their properties. They lose immunity if they post gun free zone signs.

Is this the new front in the fight to eliminate so called “gun free zone” (GFZ)?

As things stand now, there is no liability risk in most states for establishing a GFZ.  Concealed carry license holders are disarmed and those who disarm them need to do nothing to ensure the security of those on their property. It is a fantasy to believe that signs protect people in a GFZ from someone who is determined to cause harm. We know that GFZs are “hunting preserves for psychopathic murders” [ed: a term coined by Massad Ayoub] and have been the location of nearly every mass homicide, except for two, in the concealed carry era.  Therefore, it is quite predictable that the next mass murder will occur in a GFZ.

Alan Korwin makes the argument for holding liable those who create gun free zones: “If you create a gun-free zone, you’re liable for any harm it causes.”  He summarizes the fraudulent arguments of the anti-rights activists and their mythology.

They believe that:

  1. Self-defense should be illegal.
  2. Guns should be confiscated.
  3. No one but “authorities” should have guns.
  4. Government can take care of you better than you can.

The anti-self-defense lobby tells you to rely on the police for your safety. The police have no legal duty to protect you and they routinely respond only after an event to pick up the pieces. When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.

The notion that GFZs are safe is fraud perpetrated on the public because:

  1. Only innocent victims like you and me are affected.
  2. No alternate form of security is provided.
  3. Privately held firearms have been repeatedly shown to deter and prevent crime in one scholarly study after another.

At the 2015 Gun Rights Policy Conference Dr. Edeen asked, “What strategy can we have to hold the owners of gun free zones accountable when they disarm us and then something bad happens?”

Alan Gottleib, founder and Executive Vice-President of the sponsoring Second Amendment Foundation, suggested a legislative strategy that would put teeth into laws about GFZs: that if you establish a GFZ, you are held liable. This would allow those who are damaged by GFZs to seek damages. (Video of this exchange can be seen on YouTube.)

It would then become a liability to own a gun free zone. If a business posts a GFZ, it assumes the responsibility of defending the private citizen. Should citizens decide not to carry means for self-protection, that is their decision. When a business makes this decision for them, it should become responsible for the safety of all patrons.

Alan Korwin then told the audience about the two bills mentioned above which were previously put forward in the Arizona legislature.  He also reminded us that the right to bear arms is an enumerated civil right and that 18 USC Sections 241 and 242 makes it a Federal crime to either to conspire to deprive someone of a constitutionally protected right (241) or for a person to act under color of law to deprive someone of his or her rights or privileges protected under the Constitution (242).

He also implored us to make the public aware that these “make-believe gun free zones” do nothing but protect the criminal.

If a criminal has decided to commit a crime, why would they be stopped by a GFZ sign when they are already breaking the law? After the jihadist attacks in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Congress removed military bases from the list of federal GFZs because they recognized them as dangerous to our military. Civilians are also in danger in GFZs.

The only way we will be rid of these “victim disarmament zones” is when businesses and corporations recognize that their liability is greater if they perpetuate the myth that GFZs are safe and continue to employ them. Buckeye Firearms Association advises Ohio businesses and employers that when they post discriminatory signs banning Concealed Handgun License holders, they may incur liability should customers be attacked while at their facilities or in their parking lots.  They may incur duty of care and responsibility to protect customers while they are on their property. Some argue that it is the business’s freedom to decide whether firearms are allowed or not on their property. To paraphrase John B. Finch about fists and noses, a business’s freedom to make decisions ends where my right of self-defense begins.

We need to make the public aware of the dangers of these fraudulent gun free zones. An educated populace can pressure their elected representatives at the state and federal level to pass legislation that will make these ”killing spree zones” as extinct as those well-intentioned, but flawed laws should become.

 

—Andrew Crisologo, DPM is a resident in podiatric surgery at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. He seeks to be a resident voice to promote and educate others about the Second Amendment and its relation to the medical field.

—Dr. John Edeen is a Pediatric Orthopedic Surgeon in San Antonio, TX and is active in seeking the right to carry for qualified hospital staff.

Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, a project of the Second Amendment Foundation. www.drgo.us

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Eric

6 Months later , another GFZ massacre . Ignorant beliefs police will save them. Unarmed they are safe.

Art

What do we do when the entire state is effectively a gun-free zone, AKA Kalifornia?

Rich

Do You Patronize Businesses That Undermine Your Freedoms – Fact is, mindless gun-free zones are what mass shootings have in common. They are killing zones, free from good guys with guns. That’s why the Aurora movie theater killer chose the more distant theater where guns were not allowed and thus where he wouldn’t have to worry about his plan being foiled.

ammoland

Grey Beard

I have long held that any citizen with a CCW should send a Registered Letter, Return Receipt Requested, to the Owner of Every establishment with a “No Guns” sign, with copies to every “news” agency, City and County LEO with authority for the location of the business, and the Attorney General of the State, notifying them that if “I am injured on your private property arguably because I was deprived of my Natural Born Right to Self Defense, you are quilty of Gross Negligence and will be held accountable by myself, my survivors, and/or assigns.”

Chuck

Yep, hold government, government employees, and elected officials to the same standards … if ANYONE or ANY Organization act to cause or contribute to the harm of an individual, then liability should attach to that action. Watch the story change if Bloomberg and his ilk, or some jerk-off elected representatives have to pony up assets or enjoy some jail time for the harm and damage that they do. BTW some folks in NJ and San Francisco should also be personally responsible for the deaths of two ladies, one who couldn’t get a permit because “the system” sandbagged her, and the… Read more »

Raconteur

That was one thing I noticed about all the hoopla in the article, there was no mention of government GFZ’s. Universities and other non-sensitive govt locations, should be held to the same standards.

ExNuke

Bloomberg’s paid Judas Goats and the Brady Campaign to Promote Gun Violence are less responsible for businesses posting GFZ signs than the Insurance Companies. When they find that they have increased their liability by demanding the signs be posted the signs will come down in a hurry. Unless a business hires enough Armed Guards to follow each and every customer the entire time it is impossible to GUARANTEE every one of them is safe while inside and disarmed.

Chuck

Anytime someone is killed in a gun free zone, their relatives should sue the person, persons, or government for their death. It it were not gun free they might still be alive so the gun grabber are liable and only they are.

Dennis Rymon

The article sites the wrong Kansas House bill. Kansas HB 2353 adds more substances to the Schedule I narcotics lists. HB 2578 is the one that regulates signage for gun free zones in Kansas.