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Topic: Reports of shooting at Batman Premier.
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Brad Miller
Administrator
Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99
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posted 09-10-2012 07:30 PM
This one should stir up some debate...
Did Colorado shooter single out Cinemark theater because it banned guns?
quote:
By John Lott
With 12 dead and 58 wounded, the July 20th shooting at the Cinemark Century 16 Theater in Aurora, Colorado was sure to result in a lawsuit. On Friday, the first suit was announced, claiming Cinemark has “primary responsibility.” The theater did have responsibility for the attack, but not for the reasons that the lawyers bringing the case think.
The lawyer bringing the suit, Attorney Marc Bern, with the New York city law firm of Napoli, Bern, Ripka and Scholonik, suggested the theater should have had security guards the night of the attack. Yet, checking bags or metal detectors at the front of the theater that night wouldn’t have prevented the attack. The killer brought his guns in through an emergency backdoor.
Armed security guards at movie theaters are rare in low crime areas, such as Aurora, especially on less crowded weeknights. And, with an audience fleeing the theater, armed guards may have experienced difficulty getting quickly inside.
So why did the killer pick the Cinemark theater? You might think that it was the one closest to the killer’s apartment. Or, that it was the one with the largest audience.
Yet, neither explanation is right. Instead, out of all the movie theaters within 20 minutes of his apartment showing the new Batman movie that night, it was the only one where guns were banned. In Colorado, individuals with permits can carry concealed handgun in most malls, stores, movie theaters, and restaurants. But private businesses can determine whether permit holders can carry guns on their private property.
Most movie theaters allow permit holders carrying guns. But the Cinemark movie theater was the only one with a sign posted at the theater’s entrance.
A simple web search and some telephone calls reveal how easily one can find out how Cinemark compared to other movie theaters. According to mapquest.com and movies.com, there were seven movie theaters showing "The Dark Knight Rises" on July 20th within 20 minutes of the killer’s apartment at 1690 Paris St, Aurora, Colorado. At 4 miles and an 8-minute car ride, the Cinemark’s Century Theater wasn't the closest. Another theater was only 1.2 miles (3 minutes) away.
There was also a theater just slightly further away, 10 minutes. It is the "home of Colorado's largest auditorium," according to their movie hotline greeting message. The potentially huge audience ought to have been attractive to someone trying to kill as many people as possible. Four other theaters were 18 minutes, two at 19 minutes, and 20 minutes away. But all of those theaters allowed permitted concealed handguns.
So why would a mass shooter pick a place that bans guns? The answer should be obvious, though it apparently is not clear to the media – disarming law-abiding citizens leaves them as sitting ducks.
Concealed carry is much more frequent than many people believe. With over 4 percent of the adult population in Colorado having concealed handgun permits, a couple hundred adults in Cinemark’s movie theater #9 means that there is an extremely high probability that at least one adult would have a permit.
Unfortunately, some have still not figured this out. A manager at the Harkins Northfield 18 five miles from the killer’s apartment told me, the theater changed its policy and started banning concealed handguns following the Cinemark attack.
The recent Colorado and Sikh Temple shootings are by no means the first times that killers targeted gun-free zones. We have witnessed mass public shootings in such places as the Westroads Mall in Omaha, Nebraska and the Trolley Square Mall in Salt Lake City, Utah. In both cases, guns were banned at those particular malls, but not at other similar venues that allowed guns and were spared. With just one single exception, the attack in Tucson last year, every public shooting since at least 1950 in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed has taken place where citizens are not allowed to carry guns.
And remember the 1999 Columbine attack in Colorado. Few appreciate that Dylan Klebold, one of the two Columbine killers, was following Colorado legislation that would have let citizens carry a concealed handgun. Presumably, he feared being stopped during his attack by someone with a weapon. In fact, the Columbine attack occurred the very day that final passage was scheduled.
Gun-free zones are a magnet for those who want to kill many people quickly. Even the most ardent gun control advocate would never put “Gun-Free Zone” signs on their home. Let’s stop finally putting them elsewhere.
I added bold to that last bit, as I've always thought it was absolutely stupid to put up signs prohibiting guns. Anyone who is going to break the law REALLY DOESN'T CARE about those signs and will not respect the wishes of the business. The only thing the signs will stop are the law abiding citizens who aren't the problem.
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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002
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posted 09-12-2012 09:00 PM
quote: Edward Havens
Yet, there are countries like Australia, France, Poland and the UK with stricter handgun laws that have homicide by handgun rates at less than 0.50% per 100,000 capita (UK is 0.07). America is 4.14, for comparison's sake. But hey, at least we aren't Columbia ((51.77) or El Salvador (50.36).
I don't have time to research all the cities with strict gun laws right now but Washington, DC has extremely strict gun laws and the homicide rate there is 21.9 (2010 data). Like Bobby said, the violent crime issue in the US is cultural (and much of it inner city/gang related) and doesn't have anything to do with gun restrictions. If you could magically eliminate all guns from the US people would be stabbing eachother to death.
Deranged nuts like the guy that shot up the Dark Knight Rises showing would do the same thing with explosives or poison gas or something if they couldn't get guns. Heck it wouldn't be all that difficult to pump carbon monoxide into an auditorium if you really wanted to.
Bottom line is don't take away my right to have a gun because a small percentage of the population is crazy or you believe in a utopia where bad people won't kill if they don't have guns. I own firearms to protect my home and property if need be. If somebody ever entered my house in the middle of the night calling the police isn't going to protect me. My gun will.
As the saying goes, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people!"
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Edward Havens
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 614
From: Los Angeles, CA
Registered: Mar 2008
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posted 09-13-2012 10:40 AM
quote: Lyle Romer
I don't have time to research all the cities with strict gun laws right now but Washington, DC has extremely strict gun laws and the homicide rate there is 21.9 (2010 data).
A city having a strict gun control law isn't the same as an entire country. Can't get a gun in DC? Arlington or Bethesda or Rockville or Springfield are just a couple miles away. Want to get a gun in Sydney? It's going to take some effect.
quote: Lyle Romer
Like Bobby said, the violent crime issue in the US is cultural (and much of it inner city/gang related) and doesn't have anything to do with gun restrictions. If you could magically eliminate all guns from the US people would be stabbing eachother to death.
Did I say it wasn't cultural? No, I did not. It is cultural in America, because we as Americans have allowed this culture to exist for hundreds of years unabated. And unless you have some crystal ball that can clearly see alternative pasts and futures, statements like what people would do if they didn't have guns.
quote: Lyle Romer
Deranged nuts like the guy that shot up the Dark Knight Rises showing would do the same thing with explosives or poison gas or something if they couldn't get guns. Heck it wouldn't be all that difficult to pump carbon monoxide into an auditorium if you really wanted to.
Unsubstantiated speculation does nothing for the pro-gun argument. We don't know why he went on his killing spree, and now you want to say what he would have done if he didn't have easy access to high powered, high firing rate guns? I call bullsh*t! Why didn't he just use explosives or poison gas? Both of those could have killed and maimed people in other theatres besides Auditorium 9. I am not going to speculate why he didn't, because I'm not him and can't tell you why he did any of it in the first place.
The gun murder rate did not drop in countries that have strict gun laws overnight. It took decades, and those countries did not have people as psychotic about their gun as Americans are psychotic about their guns, and those countries do still have gun-related murders from time to time. They aren't perfect laws, but there aren't ~12,500 people getting killed by gun-related homicides per year in those countries either, as there are in America.
Why do 300,000,000 Americans needs 260,000,000-280,000,000 guns anyway? What foreign threat has Twin Falls ID or Rogers AR seen since those states joined the Union? And what use would ordinary citizens having easy access to guns been during the last two foreign attacks on American soil?
The Second Amendment has been so bastardized by the pro-gun lobbies that even the Supreme Court has ruled the word "militia" in the Second Amendment is for all intent and purpose meaningless in this discussion. America has a standing Armed Force with an annual budget exceeding half a trillion dollars per year, not counting the added costs of wars themselves. So why do ordinary American citizens need such easy access to guns?
Sure, a horse breeder in Berthoud CO, like my ex-father-in-law might need a shotgun to keep wild animals off his property. That's justifiable gun ownership, and that's what I am for. I am not an anti-gun nut. I am for justifiable gun ownership. My dad fought in Vietnam, and still has the rifle he was issued, for sentimental reasons. He's never once used it since he left the Armed Forces in 1968, but I can justify his having it. But when he passes, I don't know what my brother and I are going to do with it. Neither of us have ever owned a gun and have no need for a rifle. Our owning that rifle is not justifiable.
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