"Gun-toting Pa. mom gets back concealed gun permit"
A Lebanon County, PA woman gets her permit back. This story provides an example of why using temporary revocations as an example of problems with permit holders isn't very useful. Sometimes local officials just do not properly enforce the law.
The Associated Press
Tue, Oct 14, 2008 (4:42 p.m.)
A mother who angered fellow parents when she openly carried a pistol to her 5-year-old daughter's soccer game got her concealed weapons permit back Tuesday after a Pennsylvania judge overruled a sheriff's decision to revoke it.
Meleanie Hain lost the permit after other parents complained about the presence of the gun during a soccer game on Sept. 11. Lebanon County Judge Robert Eby, who said he also is a gun owner with a concealed weapons permit, said the law required him to return Hain's permit.
But he questioned her judgment, saying she "scared the devil" out of others at the soccer field.
"Fear doesn't belong at a kid's soccer game from any source," Eby said.
Hain testified at the Tuesday hearing that she did not intend to intimidate anyone but felt she had to carry the gun openly because warm-weather clothing made it difficult to hide a firearm. She said her husband's line of work, which was not disclosed, made her a "greater target" than the average person.
"I'm certainly not looking to shoot anyone over a goal," she told Eby, also adding that she had carried an unconcealed firearm without any problems in the past. . . .
Labels: ConcealedCarry
posted by John Lott at 9:00 PM
5 Comments:
I am not sure it was wise from the judge's standpoint to pander to the sentiment of insecurity. Facts overwhelmingly prove that this sentiment is unjustified. They should feel more secure, not less, because of the presence of such armed individual.
By having a judge grant some sort of moral sanction irrational fears, he simply gives more credibility to the lunacy.
It's pityful.
Conflicted: I will admit I woulld have been slightly startled at seeing her armed at the field. But then, I am from a Northeastern Coast area and have never seen any non-LEO carrying a firearm outside a gun range. Heck, I can remember a news writeup about a young lady who got in some difficulty because her bracelet, quite fashionable at the time, was technically classed as an illegal weapon!
But if it is fairly habitual, as indicated, I would have quickly become accustomed. It would probably not have occured to me to make a complaint to officials unless I thought I perceived an actual threat, though I might have asked her about it out of earshot of others.
Of course the "fun" part is that if taking the CCW had stuck she would have continued open-carry even on occasions she would otherwise have carried concealed. Including her kid's practices.
Irrational fear of a tool. More people are killed or injured by cars yet nobody cringes when walking past the Prius in the parking lot. /ss/rick v.
I don't want to open up an open-carry vs concealed-carry debate...
But there's a small part of my mind that thinks that concealed-carry laws, while a step in the right direction, are sort of a phyrric victory. The reason they have to be concealed is because of widespread hoplophobia in this country. Law-abiding citizens back in the day could carry openly without harrassment because it was common thought that only criminals concealed: for the element of surprise and because they had something to hide.
Nowadays, the views of the two main types of carry are reversed. Anyone with a visible gun is assumed to be a criminal or someone of less-than-sane mind: And law-abiding citizens, who must get permits in almost all states, conceal. Ironic, isn't it.
When you have obtained the permit to carry a concealed weapon, you should keep it concealed. Back in "the good ole days" a handgun hanging from your belt wouldn't alarm anyone. But unfortunately, were not in the texas frontier, were in the year 2008. Things are different. When i got my CCW my father (who carried on a daily basis) told me "your gun should only become visible to others in the event that you need to defend yourself, and don't pull your gun unless you are prepared to shoot someone" When someone sees your gun, they take it as a sign of aggression, understandably given the world we live in today.
When people show off their guns in public (like this woman), the media jumps all over it and runs it front page sunday morning. This is not the kind of publicity gun owners and gun rights activists need. It only increases the anti-gun public sentiment.
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