Sitting Duck Policy

An LDS Church policy, and Utah State Law, put clergy and congregation members at risk.

The policy, read in the form of a letter from the First-Presidency from pulpits across the country, asks that all members leave personal-defense weapons (specifically “guns”) at home. That “sitting duck” policy effectively advertised to the public that LDS houses of worship are “safe-zones” in which criminals can easily carry out their illegal acts.

In Utah, the LDS church asked for legislation to exempt “houses of worship” from places persons with permits to carry concealed firearms for self-defense are allowed to carry. The State Legislature added a requirement to the law that churches who intended to make their properties “sitting duck zones” notify both the public and the Department of Public Safety. To date, the LDS church is the only church who has done so.

The failure of these types of policies was illustrated recently in Visalaia, California where a former member of the LDS church (sometimes referred to as the “Mormon” church) entered an LDS house of worship and killed a bishop simply for the fact that he was a leader in the church.

The Utah Law doesn’t apply to California houses of worship, but the LDS policy making all houses of worship “sitting duck” zones does. If the LDS church didn’t have this policy this criminal may have reconsidered carrying out his violent plans. If a law-abiding member of the congregation had been exercising his or her Second Amendment Right (perhaps the bishop himself), this member of the LDS clergy might still be with us today.

We call on the leadership of the LDS church to retract their “sitting duck policy” and notify the Utah DPS that they no longer prohibit law-abiding citizens from carrying tools for self-defense. Additionally, we ask that the LDS church suggest to all of its clergy that they take whatever actions they personally feel appropriate to ensure their own safety, as well as allow congregation members to provide for their own personal safety while in or around LDS houses or worship.

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

A recent article in The Examiner sums up Chicago Mayor Daley’s response to the landmark SCOTUS case:

In an afternoon press conference, Daley announced that the city would enact new ordinances making it as difficult as possible to purchase and own a gun in Chicago. During his rant, he promised to seek ways to attack the right to bear arms from the supply side, vowing to go after manufacturers and crack down on gun shops and gun shop owners. He also noted that only “responsible adults” would be allowed to purchase or possess guns and left open the extremely disturbing question of who gets to determine which citizens are responsible and therefore ’worthy‘ of civil rights.

The article eloquently concludes:

The problem in Chicago is not guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens. It never was. The problem is crime … crime driven by poverty, and hopelessness, and drug abuse, and all the social ills that accompany them. And because Mayor Daley, in his 21 year tenure, has not been willing or able to address these very difficult problems, he seeks to blame gun owners.

This elitist defiance should not surprise those familiar with Chicago politics and the antics of the Daley administration but it should serve as a grim reminder to gun owners and civil libertarians that despite the victories in Heller and McDonald, the legislative and judicial battles are far from over.

In another “they almost got it right” story, the Arizona Daily Star reports that the company which owns and operates the majority of Pizza Hut restaurants in Southern Arizona will no longer prohibit customers from legally carrying sidearms on their property.

According to the article:

Patrick McKinney, vice president of operations for Tucson-based Pizza Hut of Arizona, said he began reconsidering the company’s policy of prohibiting guns after reading a newspaper article about the state’s new concealed-carry law.

That law, which goes into effect July 29, allows people 21 or older (and not prohibited from having a firearm) to carry a concealed gun without a permit.

McKinney and his staff held a meeting about the issue and began to remove the restaurants’ signs banning firearms during the first week of June, he said in a written reply to questions.

Unfortunately, the new policy applies only to customers. Employees will still be left sitting ducks while working for the company (on premises, or as delivery drivers). The article continues:

The issue may be particularly poignant in the case of Tucson Pizza Huts. In 1999, three employees of a Pizza Hut near the corner of East Broadway and Pantano roads were shot to death in an attempted robbery by two teens.

“We will never forget the tragedy of those murders in 1999 and what happened may have shaped our feelings about guns forever,” McKinney wrote.

The new policy doesn’t apply to employees, who won’t be able to carry guns at work. “For safety reasons we have always had a ‘no weapon’ policy (while working) for all of us at Pizza Hut of Arizona,” McKinney wrote.

One has to wonder who the Pizza Hut Employee policy is trying to “protect”. It certainly didn’t “protect” the three Pizza Hut Employees who were disarmed by Pizza Hut’s Sitting Duck Policy and were unable to protect themselves back in 1999. The Pizza Hut policy did, however, protect the assailants in that case.

The late Larry H. Miller’s Megaplex Theaters have signage on many of their doors advising would-be patrons that firearms are prohibited.

View Larger Map

A KMOX News story is reporting that St. Louis, MO supermarket chain Schnucks has taken down signage that barred concealed weapons from its stores.

Schuncks operates in seven states, five of which have provisions for law-abiding citizens to lawfully carry concealed firearms.

Lori Willis, a spokesperson for the company, says company executives decided that after years of prohibiting legal weapons from being carried in their stores, “it just wasn’t an issue, and that those who are licensed to carry concealed weapons, should be allowed to do so.”

Employees, however, are still sitting ducks as the company’s ban on employees carrying weapons while at work has not changed.

Should the circumstance ever arise, hopefully an armed civilian will come to the aid of defenseless Schnucks employees.

In yet another example of how Gun Control Gun Rights Infringement policies don’t work. Ironically, instances of late have proven that they may have the opposite affect: places that are under rules, laws, or policies which imply “no guns allowed” disarm the law-abiding citizen and ensure that only those who disregard the law carry guns (or knives, or bombs, or axe, or whatever other tool).

Let’s play a little logic game

Let’s say for whatever reason you’re an angry person and want to carry out some violent act against another person.

• There is a law that says you cannot assault another person, but you disregard that.
• There is another law that says you cannot kill another person, but you disregard that.
• There is another law that says you cannot carry a gun into a school, but you disregard that.
• There is another law that says you cannot buy a gun without jumping through a whole bunch of hoops (to keep guns out the hands of people like you), but you disregard that.
• There is another law that says you cannot carry your gun into a particular state or city without getting a permit, but permits are hard to get, so you disregard that.

Why do we need all the additional laws? Shouldn’t the first law suffice? The one that says it’s illegal to assault another person? Why do we need all the others? Aren’t they covered under the first law?

Well sure, but criminals don’t obey that law, so we need to pass another law. The criminals will obey that law, surely! But they don’t, that’s why they’re criminals!

What about this scenario

You’re a bad guy in the middle of assaulting someone. You’ve got a knife in one hand and a baseball bat in the other.

Your target has a weapon as well. In order to realize your goal you must first disarm your target, otherwise you risk being injured yourself, and being unable to carry out your crime.

Disarming your target isn’t something you want to do, you might get hurt or killed in the process. But there you are, faced with a target that refuses to be a “victim” and now you have to deal with it.

It would be a much safer place for you to carry out your crimes of violence if your targets couldn’t effectively fight back. Wouldn’t it be nice if you had an accomplice? Someone that would disarm your target before you got there?

But who could this accomplice be? In cases like this it could be the school board or the school administration. Maybe it’s the city/county/state that have passed a law that disarms the law-abiding.

Wait a minute… don’t we have laws that make it a crime for helping a bad guy commit his crimes? Does that mean the school board or legislature should be charged as accomplices? Oh? Why not? They created the policy that disarmed the targets, turning them into defenseless targets. Sounds like they helped the bad guy out to me.

Here’s another thought experiment

Let’s say you’re a bad guy, and you want to hurt people, for whatever reason, it’s not important.

You were really mad at some school principal. Two schools sit right next to each other. You aren’t sure in which school the principal works, but you’re so angry/frustrated at principals in general, you don’t really care.

The two schools are identical, same layout, same number of students, same number of faculty.

The only difference: on one school there are signs on every door that say “No Weapons Allows” and has a picture of a gun with a “no” sign through it; the other school has a sign that says “all faculty members are armed”.

Which of the two schools do you go into to carry out your violence?

You’d pick the place where you were less likely to have someone stop you from carrying out your plans, right? So do criminals.

Someplace with a “no guns” policy tells would-be criminals that beyond that sign they’ll find a “defenseless victim zone”.

If we truly want to reduce massacres wouldn’t we want to train and arm as many law-abiding people as we can, then incentivize them to carry their self-defense weapons with them in as many places as possible?

Unless Gun Control Gun Rights Infringement Laws aren’t really concerned about reducing crime at all.

Related Articles:

• http://www.freep.com/article/20091110/NEWS07/91110026/1398/CNN–Gunman-puts-N.Y.-school-on-lockdown

Reportedly, two students at Tarrant County College in Fort Worth, Texas have filed a lawsuit against the college after being forbidden from wearing empty holsters on campus as part of a national protest.

Students for Concealed Carry on Campus was formed by a University of North Texas student in reaction to the 2007 shootings on the unarmed Virginia Tech campus.

To illustrate the feeling of vulnerability to campus crime, members and supporters wear their “holster-sans-weapon”.

Angela Robinson, the attorney for the college made the following statement:

“Of course [the college] will be opposing the request to allow empty holsters on campus. The college believes it has policies to protect the constitutional rights of students on campus, but also has to worry about the safety of students.” [emphasis added]

What’s that? An empty holster somehow poses a “safety issue” for the students?

“I can’t really get into what potentially might be evidence, but you can use your imagination as to the danger of empty holsters on campus, with the partial covering of it, or who knows if it’s empty.” [emphasis added]

Yes, we can see the dangers of empty holsters on campus. We feel there are more dangers with felons, rapists, and violent criminals on campus.

Any individual or organization that restricts how or when one can defend themself, we feel, is taking upon the responsibility for their individual protection and assumes full liability for any and all damages received by their failing to provide said protection.

Related articles

• http://www.texastribune.org/blogs/post/2009/nov/05/tarrant-county-college-sued-banning-empty-holster-protest/
• http://www.concealedcampus.org/
• http://www.texastribune.org/topics/campus-carry/
• http://www.thefire.org/public/pdfs/131692335995d92a7e4e1c931152bd59.pdf

If you’re anything like us here at Sitting Duck Policy, you feel a bit upset when you come across a location that has posted a “No Guns” sign.

You feel that this not only infringes upon your Right to self-defense, but also advertises to criminals that beyond that sign is a “safe working environment” free from “potentially hazardous conditions” which could end up getting them hurt (or killed) during the commission of their crime.

You don’t like this sort of “Defenseless Victim” zone the property-owner has created by posting their signage, but how do you go about telling them, in the hopes this policy will be removed (or preferably reversed)?

Tim Oliver over at Learn to Carry has created some free cards that help you do just that! Simply download to your computer, and print on any heavy-stock paper that you want (or take the .pdf to your local Kinko’s or UPS Store and have them print and cut a few sheets for you).

SGT Jensen from Utah County, Utah snapped this picture as he was walking into Rocky Mountain Raceways in West Valley City, Utah.

Troyw64 from Herriman, Utah reports:

Went to the [Jared Galleria of Jewelry in Murray, Utah] store in Murray to buy my wife a gift, saw the sign on the door “no weapons” turned around, went back to my car and drove to [another] jeweler, made my purchase, went home and sent the standard “you won’t get my business and I’ll spread the word about your anti-gun policy’” letter to Jared with a copy of my receipt.