Actor Martin Sheen: No Right of Self Defense

by Larry Pratt

This month’s “Anti-Gun Nut” is actor Martin Sheen.

In a TV commercial for Handgun Control, Inc., a grim-faced Sheen, with
an American flag behind him, asks, among other things, if the next
President of our country should be a person who has “signed a bill
that allows hidden handguns in churches, hospitals and amusement
parks?”

Sounds pretty scary, huh? _Hidden_ handguns.

But, the truth is that making it legal to carry concealed weapons
in these places is not as crazy as Sheen and his anti-Second
Amendment, gun-grabbing friends at Handgun Control, Inc. would like
us to believe. Consider the following examples:

* Churches: In September of 1999, Larry Gene Ashbrook walked into
the Wedgewood Baptist Church in Ft. Worth, Texas, with two guns. He
murdered seven people, injured seven others and then killed himself.
Two video tapes showed Ashbrook calmly firing his guns. The Acting
Police Chief of Ft. Worth, Ralph Mendoza, says these tapes show this
cold-blooded murderer committing his massacre in a “methodical
manner,” standing there where he “fired shot after shot after shot,”
pacing back and forth.

But, of course, Ashbrook was able to carry out his slaughter at a
leisurely pace. Why? Because none of his victims, or anybody else in
the church at that time, were armed. Thus, they were sitting ducks
and never had a chance. Had even one person had a weapon, and knew
how to use it, he or she could have shot Ashbrook and saved many
lives.

And there are many other examples where a person with a “hidden”
handgun in a church could have saved lives.

A _Washington Post_ story (7/15/2000) reports how in 1993 the Rev.
Michael R. Duesterhaus, a Roman Catholic priest at Holy Spirit
Catholic Church in Annandale, Virginia, woke up at 3 a.m. to the
sound of someone breaking into his study. The priest took out a 9mm
pistol, flipped on a light and ordered the intruder to freeze and
lie on the floor. The intruder stopped and then reached for his
belt. Deusterhaus fired. The man paused, apparently wounded, then
ran into the hall.

The priest pursued him and fired again, at his feet. The priest
fired a third time, deliberately wide of his target. The man ran out
the side door escaping with a small amount of cash. The _Post_ says
this incident “contrasts sharply” with the June, 2000, “brutal
slaying” of Monsignor Thomas Wells at the Mother Seaton Catholic
Church in Germantown, Maryland, who died after being repeatedly
stabbed. The difference between these two events is that Monsignor
Wells was unarmed.

In March of 1999, in Gonzales, Louisiana, Shon Miller, Jr. entered
the New St. John Fellowship Church, fired two rounds into the
ceiling, and 17 more shots, murdering his son, his wife, a deacon
and injuring four others. You guessed it. None of Miller’s victims
or anyone around them were armed.

In Columbia, Tennessee, on New Year’s Eve of 1999, two men were shot
in the parking lot of the First Freewill Baptist Church. One died,
one did not. Jamie Edward Thompson was charged in these shootings.
Again, no victim was armed.

In Trotwood, Ohio, at the Christ Temple Apostolic Faith Church, in
September of 1998, Pastor Andrew Lofton was fatally shot. Once
again, only the murderer was armed.

In Salmon, Idaho, in March of 1997, the Rev. Wilfred Keele, retired
pastor of the Faith Bible Church, was shot to death, in his church
as he and his wife visited with members of the congregation after
the morning service. And yes, once again, nobody was armed but the
killer.

* Hospitals: A _Washington Post_ story (10/2/2000) reports that in
Ventura, California, at the Community Memorial Hospital, “a man
stabbed three staff members in a hospital waiting room, then was
shot and killed by police.” None of those attacked were armed.

In April of 2000, in Waterville, Maine, a man with a .357 magnum
abducted his estranged wife at gunpoint inside a local hospital. He
fired a bullet into the floor outside the door of a dialysis unit.
Nobody in this hospital was armed but the man with the .357 magnum.

In March of 1999, at the Mt. Zion Medical Center in San Francisco,
three nurses risked their lives when they dashed to the waiting room
to rescue a bleeding man who had just been shot in the hospital
lobby by his son. When they lifted the shooter on to a gurney, the
gunman stood waving a gun in one hand and an ammunition clip in the
other. The son died. None of these nurses were armed.

* Amusement Parks: The Bergen, New Jersey _Record_ newspaper
(10/12/93) reports that metal detectors at the Six Flags Great
Adventure amusement park netted 62 guns confiscated, twice as many
as in past years. Also seized were knives, brass knuckles, throwing
stars and nunchakus.

And the _Los Angeles Times_ (6/12/90) reports that Nathan Nicholas
Tripp was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the 1988
killings of two Universal Studios guards. These guards were
murdered, shot to death, when they turned Tripp away from this
amusement park gate. Oh, and these guards were _unarmed_.

So, yes, Mr. Sheen, the answer to your question, sir, is that we
should definitely elect a President who, among other things, favors
the right of our citizens to carry concealed weapons in churches,
hospitals, and amusement parks. If this is allowed, a lot of lives
can be saved and crime will be reduced.

As John Lott documents in his excellent book _More Guns, Less
Crime_, laws that allow concealed handguns have reduced the murder
rate by 8.5 percent, rape by 5 percent and severe assault by 7
percent. And had such laws prevailed throughout the country, there
would have been 1,600 fewer murders, 4,200 fewer rapes and 60,000
fewer assaults.

— GOA —

[Larry Pratt is Executive Director of Gun Owners of America located
at 8001 Forbes Place, Springfield, VA 22151 and at
http://www.gunowners.org on the web.]