Another mass public shooting at another gun-free zone: the Gilroy Garlic Festival attack

Jul 29, 2019 | Featured

UPDATE: Governor Newsom: “This is insane. Only in America, only in America, here we go again.” Yet, few seem to realize how much more common mass public shootings are in the rest of the world, including parts of Europe. An earlier similar study was published in a peer-reviewed journal.

Original Post: Santa Clara County where the attack occurred at the Gilroy Garlic Festival provides an all too typical example. Three people were killed and 15 injured. The media can mention the metal detectors and the attacker cutting his way through the fence to avoid detection, but they seem unable to explicitly mention that the attack was in another gun-free zone.

But as a general point, even if this wasn’t an area where people were already banned from having guns, do you wonder why there isn’t someone to stop some of the mass public shootings in places such as California? In 2018, the County with a little over 1.5 million adults had issued just 113 concealed handgun permits — that is just 0.007% of adults. To put it differently, that is only 1 permit issued for every 14,300 people. General citizens in Santa Clara County are banned from being able to carry concealed handguns. There is no nearby county that has even one percent of the population with permits, and for California as a whole, only 0.39% of adults have a permit. Last year, outside the restrictive states of California and New York, about 8.63% of the adult population has a permit.

What very few permits are granted in the county are going to be granted in in San Jose and the wealthiest areas of the county, not in Gilroy.

Here is a list of cases we found where concealed handgun permit holders have stopped what otherwise would have been a mass public shooting.

Again, police are important, but they have a very difficult job in stopping these types of attacks. Attackers will either wait until there are no officers nearby or if there is an officer nearby, they will kill him first. There were police near, but even a minute or two is a very long time.

Democrats were again pushing for gun control within hours of the attack, yet it is hard to ignore that California already has some of the strictest possible gun control laws. The problem is that strict gun control causes these problems and the solution is then even stricter regulations instead of seeing to remove some of the restrictions that they already had.

Permits don’t come cheap in California: $150 for psychological screening & initial processing fee of $20, $80 for permit processing fee. The 16 hours of training are added on top of that. Something well over $500 is required to get a permit.

 

johnrlott

26 Comments

  1. Pat

    Plus, it was a “Gun Free Zone” within a “Gun Free State”. Metal Detectors and Searches were being conducted at the entrance.

    • David M. Gross

      Which is why he cut the fence to get in, not using the official entrance.

      • Ryan

        Which is exactly why gun control laws don’t work and criminals don’t care about laws. Just like cutting through the fence, only law abiding citizens go through the checkpoints.

        • Ivar Ivarsson

          Wow, it’s just like the illegal aliens coming over the border. Link?

        • Danny Harris

          Exactly, it f the state would allow more ccp for last abiding citizens then we would have people all over as first responders taking out these deranged lunatics when it begins, not after Dozens if innocent people are killed waiting for PD to arrive!

  2. Stuart Nuss

    You cannot stop these horrific events by creating more defenseless victims. An armed response is required, and the police cannot be everywhere.

    • Richard

      Right on! Another shooting in a GUN FREE ZONE, the shooter cut thru a fence in order to gain access to the event, why did he do that, because they had metal detectors at the entrances, according to reports, he used an “AK 47 style” rifle and 30 round magazine, both illegal to possess in California, democRAT presidential candidates are already calling for stiffer gun control laws, the perp already had broken several existing gun control laws, what type of law do these delusional politicians want to enact now, what makes them think that a guy like this that already broke so many laws, is going to obey any other law they enact, gun laws are only meant to restrict law abiding citizens, not criminals!…….

  3. David Yinger

    While I agree that concealed-carry permits are generally a good thing (I have one and I carry)..it would likely not have made a difference this time. I know the layout at that festival, having performed on that stage for 17 years..the first person to confront that scumbag was a heroic Gilroy PD officer who shot him dead immediately. A concealed permit holder could not have done better sooner.

    • Toni Filliger

      Yeah, they could have stopped him 20 people sooner!

    • JasonR

      You cannot know that a CCW permittee in condition yellow couldn’t have stopped this sooner. They might have stopped it just spotting the shooter with the rifle, discretely readied their hand on their firearm under their shirt, and as soon as he pulled up the firearm, shot him before he could even fire a shot.

      Yes, it may be somewhat far fetched, but you just can’t know. But it’ll never happen so long as they insist on disarming us.

    • Steve P Garan

      Concealed weapons permits are your first line of defense when you are suddenly in the wrong place at the wrong time with an active shooter … The problem was knowing everyone at the festival would be unarmed … Not knowing a Policeman was in the immediate vicinity was this maniacs fatal mistake! …

    • Frederick Drury

      If you really believe that then you should cancel your permit and find a country that is a police state to protect you from all the “bad guys” I am a trained marksman with a pistol and could have easily taken out that perp. If you can’t shoot well and have the nature to not get all flustered when in a potentially violent situation then you should not be carrying a gun.

  4. Kevin L. Wells

    The “First Responders” were not armed. When will the posturing politicians face the fact that the victims respond first, and sometimes the response is ineffective because they have no means to counter the force directed at them.

    We have to change the language surrounding these events.

  5. Mrmopar

    No matter how many laws we make the BAD GUYS will STILL have guns
    The less guns the GOOD GUYS have the more we’ll be subjected to the BAD GUYS

  6. Bob Blase

    No amount of gun control against law-abiding citizens will prevent a would-be killer from obtaining a firearm.

  7. John

    Demon crats immediately go to gun issues. Confiscate. More laws

    The injured and dead could have. Even severely curtailed if a concealed carrier was there and took action to defend everyone

    God bless the victims and the great job by the police

  8. Matthew

    In reality there’s no such thing as gun violence…only violence…same as it ever was.

  9. Kelly W Moore

    Its not the gun it is society my friends we are so jacked up as country it is unreal Democrats and the media are the biggest problems we have in America today constantly keeping the pot stirred up by not telling the truth very dangerous to the American people

  10. E Bartlett

    It will only make the anti gunners want to push even more for gun control and anti gun laws.

  11. Steve Schiotis

    So fed up with the moronic politicians that what MORE gun control! Nobody was armed except for the police and the shooter! Metal detectors had been put in place, further ensuring nobody would be able to stop a shooter! This is madness! If CCW holders were allowed to carry within the festival, chances are one of them might have stopped this sick SOB and saved lives!

  12. Patrick Wildt

    Right on cue, here come the gun grabbing gaggle. Kamala Harris, Corey Booker, and Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke, are all “heartbroken”, but know just how to fix this. Disarm the law abiding gun owners, then the crazies will stop doing this…right? If someone had tried this crap in Texas, they would likely not have gotten the chance to reload, as several attendees with concealed carry permits would have cancelled his check in short order! You can’t create wealth by taxing it from those who create it with labor and imagination. You can’t lift someone up by standing on another. And you DAMN sure cannot stop crazy people shooting up venues, by disarming the sane citizenry. This is lunacy at it’s most prominent!

  13. Robert

    So many comments lamenting the lack of CC weapons to quickly respond to this shooter. While I heartily agree, it is, in my opinion not the lack of weapons causing the problem. In this gun free zone, the perpetrator(s) cut through the surrounding (security) fencing to gain access to the unarmed victims. Just an observation.

    • Joe

      Just why do you think he cut through the fence? He knew no one was carrying a firearm, which made into a free for all target shoot. Yes shootings happen where there are armed citizens, but they been by shooters with riffles from a distance, again back to my point they made it a target shoot by hiding not up close. You have never heard of someone sneaking into the NRA meetings and open fire. Guns are just a tool to commit violence, they are not the problem we have in this country. That would be like saying the fork has made someone fat. It should be law that every legal and sane American citizen should be required to carry a firearm. That would curtail a lot of the violence that has been committed by the use of firearms.

    • Joseph Meyer

      We need better walls?

  14. Howard

    It appears they got all of the guns from the law abiding people that were there. Problem is, that wasn’t enough. Duh!

  15. Tom Sullivan

    Don’t forget the California Legislature exempted Themselves from the Gun laws They enacted.

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