The Oklahoman Editorial: Should Oklahomans Worry About Concealed Carry Licensees?

The Oklahoman Editorial ~ "If the number of concealed handgun license holders is any indication,” said a Tulsa World story two years ago, "robbers may have to worry about more than stolen goods during a heist.”

Should Oklahomans now worry about those license holders, given the fact that one of them recently killed a 16-year-old who was attempting to rob his pharmacy?

We don’t think so, but the question must be asked. The state has nearly 78,000 concealed carry permit holders; the number is growing by the day. Incidences involving permit holders, however, are extremely rare.

Nevertheless, reporting by The Oklahoman’s Nolan Clay on the mental state of Jerome Ersland raises questions about the law and whether Ersland should have been issued a permit.

Read the entire editorial at http://www.newsok.com/shooting-raises-question-on-concealed-carry-permits/article/3376400?custom_click=pod_headline_opinion-oklahoman-editorials.

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2nd Amendment Expert On Pharmacy Shooting: 'Imminent threat' Means Just That

Nationally-recognized 2nd Amendment expert Howard Nemerov of Austin, Texas, weighs in on the Oklahoma City pharmacy shooting with an analysis in three parts that focuses on what the law says about "imminent danger" facing law-abiding citizens and what justifies, and does not justify, the use of deadly force.

Read Nemerov's reports at http://www.examiner.com/x-2879-Austin-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2009m6d2-Justifying-deadly-force-Part-1.

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Police, DA Clear Homeowner In Shooting

Oklahoma City police and District Attorney David Prater have cleared homeowner Scott Henson in the shooting death of an intruder inside Henson's home last week.

Prater said it appears Henson, who holds a license to carry a concealed firearm, was justified in shooting 29-year-old Ronald Penn when he found Penn inside his home when he returned for lunch. Henson said he drew his pistol and fired when Penn made an aggressive move toward him.

Prater's comments in the Henson case came as he discussed the filing of a first degree murder charge against pharmacist Jerome Ersland in the shooting death of an armed robber on May 19th. Prater said Ersland, who also holds a license to carry a concealed firearm, fired five shots at near-point blank range into Antwun Parker after Parker already was incapacitated by a shot to his head. "It's a good example of what not to do," Prater said of Ersland's action.

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OKC Homeowner Shoots, Kills Intruder

For the second time in as many weeks, a person licensed to carry a concealed firearm has shot and killed an intruder.

Today, Oklahoma Cityan Scott Henson returned home for lunch and found an intruder in his home. A confrontation occurred and Henson shot and killed the man, his wife said.

Recently, a pharmacist with a concealed carry license shot and killed an armed robber who was firing his semi-automatic pistol at the pharmacist and other employees.

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City Woman's Gunfire Sends Intruder Fleeing

KFOR-TV reports that an Oklahoma City woman, identified as being associated with the National Rifle Association, fired two shots at an intruder in her garage early today.

The television station reported the woman, who identified herself as NRA legislative liaison Heather Fitzgerald, was using her computer at a desk in her garage and had opened the garage door several feet to allow cool air into the garage. She looked up to see an intruder slide under the door. She grabbed her laser-equipped Glock 9mm semi-automatic pistol and fired twice. She said she fired not to hit him, but to scare him off. The intruder, apparently not hit by the bullets, fled. Police found a piece of electronic equipment in the front yard, apparently left by the intruder in his haste to flee.

Fitzgerald said she had her laser sighted on the intruder's back, but did not fire a third shot as he fled.

Fitzgerald said she is licensed to carry a concealed firearm and always takes her pistol with her when she is working at her computer in a part of the garage she uses as a home office.

Police said that under Oklahoma law, the woman was within her rights to use deadly force against the intruder. One officer on the scene congratulated her for her quick thinking.

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Burglar Flees As Armed Homeowner Shows Firearm

Portsmouth, Maine ~ When Christopher Duhan kicked open the back door of a Seabrook residence to commit a Monday afternoon burglary, he was met by the lady of the house who chased him off with her handgun, according to police.

Duhan, 28, of 147 Ashworth Ave., Hampton Beach, was arraigned Tuesday in Portsmouth District Court on a felony count of burglary.

According to an affidavit by officer Scott Mendes, Seabrook patrol officers were dispatched to a B Street residence at 12:30 p.m. Monday, for an "active" daytime burglary. The homeowner told police she was about to take a shower when she heard "loud crashing," so she grabbed her pistol and came face-to-face with the intruder, who she recognized as Duhan, a drug-dependent friend of a family member, according to court documents.

Gun in hand, the homeowner told Duhan she was calling the police before he fled across Route 1, police allege.

Based on a clothing and vehicle description, Seabrook police arrested Duhan at a Hampton hotel where he has been residing, according to the affidavit.

While seeking high cash bail, Mendes told the court that Duhan was on bail for two counts of receiving stolen property and was just arraigned for a second-offense charge of driving while intoxicated when he attempted to burglarize the Seabrook home.

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Unarmed Hero Tried To End Alabama Massacre

Samson, AL ~ Many around Samson knew Bruce Maloy as their town's comedian, a goodhearted, wiry little jokester who was always boasting about hitting it big someday.

In life, he never really got the spotlight he was seeking. But in the days following the massacre that shattered their small Alabama community, some have dropped the comedian label and replaced it with another: Hero.

Read the entire story at http://www.newsmax.com/us/south_alabama_shootings/2009/03/13/191815.html.

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Homeowner Wins Gunfight With Burglar

A Tulsa homeowner shot and killed a man who was breaking into his house early Tuesday, police said.

Shortly before 3 a.m., three individuals broke into a home in the 1300 block of North Irvington Avenue, Tulsa Police Cpl. Mark Shelton said.

Many of the 15 to 20 occupants were awake, including the homeowner, who heard the break-in and got his gun.

Two of the burglars, including one who was armed, were moving through the house when they encountered the homeowner, Shelton said.

Gunfire was exchanged. The homeowner shot one of the burglars twice in the chest, and the homeowner's wife was shot in the abdomen.

The wounded burglar left the house before collapsing and dying in the front yard. His name has not been released.

The homeowner's wife was hospitalized but is expected to recover.

The other two burglars ran from the house and were not located, Shelton said. They were described as black, in their late teens and wearing hooded sweatshirts and dark baggy pants.

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.40 Caliber Pistol Wound Sobers Up Invader

BROKEN ARROW ~ A man who was shot by a homeowner after he broke into the latter’s home was released from the hospital Thursday morning and transported immediately to the Tulsa Jail, police said.

Stephen Richardson, 19, could be charged with first-degree burglary in connection with the Saturday incident at a Broken Arrow residence in the 3100 block of West Norman Circle, police said.

Police say the homeowner, identified by the Tulsa World through public records as Curtis Freeman, shot Richardson with a .40-caliber handgun after Richardson entered the home by allegedly breaking the master bedroom’s back-door window.

“The suspect threw a rock through the glass portion of the door, then reached through the window, unlocked the door, and entered the residence,” a police report stated.

Richardson entered the master bedroom and was trying to enter the hallway when he was shot, police said.

Police said the homeowner’s wife and son also were present at the time. Police say the homeowner is considered the victim in the crime.

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Gun Sales Spike As Election Nears

From The Washington Post ~ Americans have cut back on buying cars, furniture and clothes in a tough economy, but there's one consumer item that's still enjoying healthy sales: guns.

Purchases of firearms and ammunition have risen 8 to 10 percent this year, according to state and federal data.

Several variables drive sales, but many dealers, buyers and experts attribute the increase in part to concerns about the economy and fears that if Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois wins the presidency, he will join with fellow Democrats in Congress to enact new gun controls.

Obama has said he believes in an individual right to bear arms but that he also supports "common-sense safety measures."

"Even though (Obama) has a lot going for him, he's not very pro-gun," said Paul Pluff, a spokesman for Massachusetts-based Smith & Wesson, which has reported higher sales. Gun enthusiasts are "going to go out and get (firearms) while they still can."

Gun purchases have also been climbing because of the worsening economy, which fuels fears of crime and civil disorder, industry sources and specialists said.

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Are Criminals Getting This Message?

Police, Private Citizens Protecting Themselves

By Kevin Johnson/USA Today ~ The number of justifiable homicides committed by police and private citizens has been rising in the past two years to their highest levels in more than a decade, reflecting a shoot-first philosophy in dealing with crime, say law enforcement analysts.

The 391 killings by police that were ruled justifiable in 2007 were the most since 1994, FBI statistics show. The 254 killings by private individuals found to be self-defense were the most since 1997.

The FBI says a homicide committed by a private citizen is justified when a person is slain during the commission of a felony, such as a burglary or robbery. Police are justified, the FBI says, when felons are killed while the officer is acting in the line of duty. Rulings on these deaths are usually made by the local police agencies involved.

Some law enforcement analysts say the numbers represent changing attitudes on the streets, where police have felt more threatened by well-armed offenders, and citizens have taken greater responsibility for their own safety.

Northeastern University criminal justice professor James Alan Fox describes an emerging "shoot-first" mentality by police and private citizens. For several years, police departments have armed their officers with higher-powered weapons to keep pace with criminal gangs. "Clearly there is a message out there that citizens may be able to defend themselves" as well, he says.

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Barack Obama The Ultimate Gun-grabber

By John R. Lott Jr./Senior research scientist, University of Maryland

Barack Obama claims he is a friend of gun owners. He certainly has convinced the media. On Thursday, the Los Angeles Times said the NRA's opposition to Obama seemed strange because "Obama does not oppose gun rights. He has made a point of pounding this home to rural audiences, telling them he has no intention of taking their guns away: not their shotguns, not their handguns, not anything."

From the Boston Globe to FactCheck.org, the media and their watchdogs have uncritically recited Obama's statement that he believes there is an individual right to own guns. How does Brooks Jackson, FactCheck.org's director, explain the NRA's opposition to Obama? He says: "They are lying. . . . They are just making this up."

Yet, while the media and their checkers take Obama's current statements about his beliefs at face value, the NRA doesn't. So who is right?

In Pennsylvania, the answer could alter the election outcome. With about one million of the country's 12.5 million hunters, Pennsylvanians spend more time hunting than the residents of any other state. Pennsylvania also has more concealed-handgun permit holders than any other state, about 600,000.

In June, when the Supreme Court struck down the gun ban in Washington, D.C., Obama claimed that the decision merely confirmed his own view. He told Fox News that he had "said consistently that I believe that the Second Amendment is an individual right, and that was the essential decision that the Supreme Court came down on."

But that doesn't square with statements Obama has made in the past. Just last November, Obama's campaign told the Chicago Tribune, "Obama believes the D.C. handgun law is constitutional." After Obama's later statement supporting the Supreme Court decision, the campaign disowned the Tribune quote as a staffer's "inartful attempt" to characterize his position.

Obama also blamed a 1996 statement supporting a handgun ban on a staffer's mistake. But Politico discovered a copy of the candidate's statement with Obama's own handwritten comments on it.

Obama personally voiced support for the D.C. ban at other times. In February, Leon Harris, a news anchor for the ABC affiliate in Washington, said to Obama: "One other issue that's of great importance here in the district as well is gun control . . . but you support the D.C. handgun ban." Obama's simple response: "Right." When Harris added "and you've said that it's constitutional," Obama again said "right," and he is clearly seen on tape nodding his head in agreement.

In fact, Obama has a long history of supporting city gun bans. The Associated Press described his vote on a gun-control bill in 2004: "He also opposed letting people use a self-defense argument if charged with violating local handgun bans by using weapons in their homes. The bill was a reaction to a Chicago-area man who, after shooting an intruder, was charged with a handgun violation."

No major-party presidential nominee has ever had as strong and consistent an anti-gun record as Obama. Here is a politician who supported a ban on handguns in 1996, backed a ban on the sale of all semiautomatic guns in 1998 (which would encompass most guns sold in the country), and advocated banning gun sales within five miles of a school or park in 2004 (a virtual ban on all gun stores). He also served on the board of the Joyce Foundation, the largest private funder of anti-gun research in the country.

This evidence should be sufficient, but I have yet another reason to be skeptical. I knew Obama during the mid-1990s, when we were both at the University of Chicago Law School. Indeed, when I introduced myself to him, he said, "Oh, you are the gun guy."
I responded, "Yes, I guess so." His response, as I recall it, was, "I don't believe that people should be able to own guns."

When I said it might be fun sometime to talk about the question and his support of Chicago's lawsuit against gunmakers, he simply grimaced and turned away, ending the conversation.

Obama obviously thinks the gun issue is important. He and his surrogates constantly repeat the claim that he has always supported an individual right to own guns. But the media should stop uncritically reporting the claim without checking his past statements.

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Control Of Shotgun Saves Texas Couple

BLUE MOUND, Texas ~ When two gunmen smashed through the glass front door of her suburban Fort Worth home, Kellie Hoehn didn't think twice.

The 34-year-old mother of two grabbed a shotgun that had been pointed at her face early Wednesday, starting a struggle that ended with one intruder killed with his own weapon and another in the hospital.

"I wasn't going to let them get to my babies," she said, recalling the moment when she pushed up the muzzle of the shotgun, pointing it away from her children's rooms.

Although the intruders told her to keep quiet, she screamed for her husband. She told her 12-year-old son, who was awakened by the sound of the shattering glass front door, to get his 5-year-old sister and hide.

"It was like a horror movie," her husband, 32-year-old Keith Hoehn, told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. "I thought I was a dead man. We're fighting for our lives."

With Kellie Hoehn clinging to the weapon's muzzle, her husband tackled the man who held the shotgun. She knocked the intruder in the head with a jar candle, giving her husband a chance to wrest the shotgun.

By then the tussle had spilled out onto the front lawn. Keith Hoehn shot one of the men who had a pistol, police said. Wounded, that man ran away.
Then the intruder who initially had the shotgun charged Keith Hoehn.

Kellie Hoehn told The Dallas Morning News that she screamed at her husband, "Shoot him, shoot him, shoot him."

Her husband fired the shotgun and the man fell to the ground. Then the shot man lunged a second time.

"Well, I shot him again, and I guess that was it," Keith Hoehn said.

Dakota Scott Benoit, 20, of Richland Hills, was pronounced dead at a hospital. John Garland Pierson, 25, of Haltom City, was in critical condition and in police custody at the hospital.

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DA Says Property Owner Shooting Justified

No charges will be filed against a Midwest City man who shot and killed an apparent burglar after the burglar tried to hit him with a vehicle. Oklahoma County prosecutors say 44-year-old Steven Palenko was defending himself when he shot 34-year-old Mikah Smith on July 17. Investigators say Palenko shot Smith with a shotgun after interrupting an apparent burglary attempt. He shot at Smith's car when it veered toward him as Smith was trying to drive away.

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Armed OKC Homeowner Stops Burglar

An Oklahoma City homeowner armed with his pistol shot and wounded a burglar who lunged at him inside his home, police say.

The unidentified homeowner shot the burglar, Alex Downing, in the buttocks, after he found Downing in his home office trying to steal items. He shot Downing after the man apparently lunged at him after being confronted and told to raise his hands. Downing apparently then realized the homeowner was armed and turned away just as the homeowner fired.

Downing is charged with first-degree burglary.

The homeowner, who is licensed to carry a concealed weapon, held Downing at gunpoint after calling police.

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After Concealed Carry, Michigan A Safer State

From the Detroit Free Press: Six years after new rules made it much easier to get a license to carry concealed weapons, the number of Michiganders legally packing heat has increased more than six-fold.

But dire predictions about increased violence and bloodshed have largely gone unfulfilled, according to law enforcement officials and, to the extent they can be measured, crime statistics.

The incidence of violent crime in Michigan in the six years since the law went into effect has been, on average, below the rate of the previous six years. The overall incidence of death from firearms, including suicide and accidents, also has declined.

More than 155,000 Michiganders -- about one in every 65 -- are now authorized to carry loaded guns as they go about their everyday affairs, according to Michigan State Police records.

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Missouri Teenager Controls Gun, Kills Intruder

Columbia, MO ~ Police in Columbia have seen several recent instances where would-be crime victims have fought back, including one case where the suspect was fatally shot.

Police said Henry Brown was shot Thursday while trying to break into an apartment. Brown later died. Authorities said the shooter, 18-year-old Alvin Canton, acted in a manner of self-defense that is protected by Missouri's "Castle Doctrine." That law allows homeowners to use deadly force against unlawful intruders. It took effect earlier this year.

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Concealed Carry LIcensee Stops Armed Robbery

A grocery store customer in Indianapolis is being credited with halting an armed robbery by pulling his own weapon and pointing it at the assailant until police arrived.

According to a report in the Indianapolis Star, Charlie Merrell, 51, was in a checkout line at a grocery store called Bucks IGA on the city's south side when a "masked man jumped a nearby counter and held a gun on a store employee."

The police report cited by the newspaper said the incident happened at 5:17 in the afternoon Monday as Merrell was doing some year-end shopping.

"While the suspect was demanding cash from the workers," according to the police report, "Merrell pulled his own handgun, pointed it at the robber and ordered him to put down his weapon."

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Armed Citizen Fights Off Five Attackers

ORLANDO, FL ~ A Central Florida man who collects cash for parking at a church fought off five armed men who had ambushed him and demanded cash.

The 65-year-old victim, who did not want to be identified, said he was collecting cash in the Parramore area before an Orlando Magic basketball game when someone put a gun to his head.

He noticed that that he was surrounded by four other men as well.

The man said he pretended to reach into his jacket for cash but instead pulled out his legally-carried hidden pistol and opened fire. The men fled during the shooting and it was not known if any of them were hit by bullets.

The victim said he had a permit for the concealed weapon. He said he has been a victim of crime before: "A couple of years ago, eight teens attacked me with a pipe trying to rob me," the man said.

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Firearms Expert Debuts New Website

Firearms expert Tom Gresham of the radio show "Gun Talk" (heard on KTOK-AM 1000) and The Outdoor Channel's "Personal Defense TV" show, has a new website with training and safety videos. Gresham's http://www.guntalk.tv/ now has more than a hundred videos available for viewing. He's shooting for 500 within a year.

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