BELLEVUE, WA – The quick actions of a legally-armed private citizen saved countless lives Sunday at a crowded Indiana shopping mall, and that courageous young man is rightfully being hailed as a hero, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.
“While the gun prohibition lobby is remaining essentially silent,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb, “we are glad to see the mayor and police chief of Greenwood, Indiana crediting the armed citizen for stopping what could have been a slaughter. Even the Greenwood Park Mall has posted a statement on its website expressing gratitude to the first responders, including what it calls the ‘heroic actions of the Good Samaritan who stopped the suspect.’
“It wasn’t the first time a good guy with a gun has stopped a bad guy,” he continued. “Last year, the FBI noted six incidents in which armed citizens intervened in mass shootings, including four where the perpetrator was killed. The gun ban lobby has long justified its push for disarming private citizens by arguing that if gun control saves just one life, it’s worthwhile. But how many lives were saved Sunday because a responsible young man was armed? All we hear from gun grabbers right now are crickets.”
Indiana is one of 25 states where citizens don’t even need a permit to carry, Gottlieb noted. At last check, more than 1.1 million Hoosiers were licensed to carry.
“Sadly,” Gottlieb acknowledged, “three innocent people were murdered and two others were wounded, but how many more might have lost their lives had it not been for the quick reaction of a heroic armed citizen?
“Law-abiding Americans don’t carry guns to harm anyone,” he observed. “We carry guns to defend ourselves and others from criminals and crazy people in sudden emergencies as we witnessed Sunday in Indiana. In such cases, armed citizens become the first responders, and their actions underscore the continuing importance of the Second Amendment.
“We’re saddened by the loss of innocent lives,” Gottlieb concluded, “but we’re glad there was an armed citizen on the scene to prevent the tragedy from being worse. Keep in perspective that restrictive gun laws didn’t stop the killer. An armed citizen did that because the law, and the Constitution protect his right to keep and bear arms.”
With more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is one of the nation’s premier gun rights organizations. As a non-profit organization, the Citizens Committee is dedicated to preserving firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected officials and facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in local communities throughout the United States. The Citizens Committee can be reached by phone at (425) 454-4911, on the Internet at www.ccrkba.org or by email to InformationRequest@ccrkba.org.
